Abstract Detail

Systematics Section

Rodrigues, Anuar [1], Colwell, Alison [2], Stefanovic, Sasa [3].

Phylogeny of the parasitic genus Conopholis (Orobanchaceae): Evidence from plastid and nuclear DNA sequences.

Little is known of the evolutionary relationships among populations and species of Conopholis, a small holoparasitic genus with reduced vegetative morphology. In the most recent taxonomic classification of this genus, Conopholis is described as having two species, C. americana and C. alpina. This classification is based on a combination of presence/absence of characters along with a number of quantitative traits. We conducted the first phylogenetic study of Conopholis designed to develop a resolved and well-supported multi-locus phylogenetic hypothesis for this genus. We analyzed plastid (trnfM-E intergenic spacer and clpP gene/introns) and nuclear (phyA intron 1) nucleotide sequence data using the neighbor-net, Bayesian, and parsimony approaches in addition to conducting tests of alternative hypotheses. Our data set contained populations from a wide taxonomic sampling covering its entire geographical range in North America. The results indicate that regardless of the data set used or phylogenetic methodology employed, none of our analyses lend support for the strict subdivision of the genus into the two currently recognized species. Instead, three distinct genetic clusters were recovered and indicates that reciprocal monophyly between the two currently accepted species has not yet been achieved. Conopholis alpina is paraphyletic and shows evidence of belonging to at least two separate lineages. The monophyly of C. americana was also not recovered; however, this possibility could not be rejected with confidence. These analyses recovered three distinct lineages indicating that there could be a minimum of three species within the genus. We anticipate that a fine-scale morphometric analysis of morphological features within Conopholis may reveal shared features that could further corroborate our molecular results.

Broader Impacts:

1 - Univeristy of Toronto Mississauga, Biology, 3359 Mississauga Road North, Mississauga, ON, L5L 1C6, Canada
2 - Division of Biological Resources, Yosemite National Park, El Portal, CA, 95318, USA
3 - UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO, Department Of Botany, 3359 MISSISSAUGA RD N, MISSISSAUGA, ON, L5L 1C6, Canada

Keywords:
Orobanchaceae
Conopholis
parasitic plant.

Presentation Type: Oral Paper:Papers for Sections
Session: 36
Location: Lindell B/Chase Park Plaza
Date: Tuesday, July 12th, 2011
Time: 4:15 PM
Number: 36012
Abstract ID:157