Co-evolved relationship between two organisms Essay - 1

Co-evolved relationship between two organisms - Essay Example Mycorrhizal association are due to a relative diffusion process of co-evolutionary. While the initial mycorrhizal symbioses events may have included reciprocal changes in the genetic composition of free-living fungi and ancestral plants, the existing evidence indicate that the current parallel partners evolution as they respond to the changes in the environment. Co-evolved relationships involve a vast number of relationships between animals and plants and in some cases between plants with other plants. Among the many co-evolved situations, there is commensalisms where different species coevolved so as to intimately live with each other without any harm on the participants and symbioses where the coevolving species live together literally (Cairney and Burke 63). Such relationships which are intertwined may assume a mutualism form where no partner involved is harm and they both benefit from each other or only one benefits. An example of such relationships includes algae and fungi in lichens, roots and fungi in mycorrhizae and acacia trees and ants in symbiotic mutualism where the ant protects the acacias from herbivores (Cairney and Burke 64). In parasitism relationship, one of the partners stands out to benefit at the others expense. A good example of such relationship is between the oak tree and mistletoe parasite. The interaction of organisms encompasses the entire ecosystem and it influences the communities and natural population’s structure. For example, more than ninety percent of the terrestrial plants exist naturally through mutualistic symbiosis together with soil fungi, to form what is referred to as mycorrhizal association (Read 380). Such symbioses have proved to be fundamental to most plant’s biology in the environment as they enhance the ecological fitness and nutrition of individual plants while at the same time shaping the dynamics and structure of plant communities and