Diversifying floral organ identity

A fascinating component of floral morphological diversity is the evolution of novel floral organ identities. Perhaps the best-understood example of this is the evolutionary sterilization of stamens to yield staminodes, which have evolved independently numerous times across angiosperms and display a considerable range of morphologies. We are only beginning to understand how modifications of the ancestral stamen developmental program have produced staminodes, but investigating this phenomenon has the potential to help us understand both the origin of floral novelty and the evolution of genetic networks more broadly.