UC Merced Undergraduate Research Journal

Carnivorous plants have evolved convergently around five times in evolutionary history. These plants are found in poor-soil environments and adapt their leaves to form mechanisms to trap prey, in order to outsource nutrients missing from the soil. New developments in digestive enzymes and leaf modification into traps have been found recently. Carnivorous plants shed an important light in the relationship between ecology and evolution and how changes in environment can lead to changes in form and function. Concerns about climate change’s potential effect on carnivorous plants have also been of great discussion recently, with pushes to conserve the carnivorous plants.