Bread and hummus: trait connectance and correlation pleiades in grain crops

Phenotypic connectance is the level of linkage between traits.Correlation pleiades-correlations between some traits and, simultaneously, lack of correlations between these and other traits-have been interpreted as the partial independence between certain developmental processes, and as the outcome from the discrepancy between the drivers of the trait and the selective forces influencing its function.Here, I show the frequency distribution of phenotypic connectance conformed to a power law for wheat and chickpea datasets, consistent with developmental self-organization.The clustering of lower connectance for traits with higher heritability suggests a relational triangle: high connectancelow heritabilityhigh phenotypic plasticity.