title: One species or at least eight? Delimitation and distribution of Frullania tamarisci (L.) Dumort. s. l. (Jungermanniopsida, Porellales) inferred from nuclear and chloroplast DNA markers.
abstract: Frullania tamarisci is usually regarded as a polymorphic, holarctic-Asian liverwort species with four allopatric subspecies [subsp. asagrayana, moniliata, nisquallensis and tamarisci]. This hypothesis is examined using a dataset including sequences of the nuclear internal transcribed spacer region and the plastid trnL-trnF and atpB-rbcL regions of 88 accessions of F. tamarisci and putatively related taxa. Maximum parsimony and maximum likelihood analyses indicate the presence of at least eight main lineages within F. tamarisci s. l. The long branches leading to the tip nodes of the different F. tamarisci s. l. clades and their partly sympatric distribution reinforce species rank. Within F. tamarisci s. l. we recognize the Asian F. moniliata, the western North American F. californica and F. nisquallensis, the eastern North American F. asagrayana, the eastern North American-European F. tamarisci s. str., the Macaronesian F. sergiae, and two newly identified European lineages assigned to as F. calcarifera and F. tamarisci var. azorica. The considerable sequence differences are not reflected in conspicuous morphological disparities, rendering F. tamarisci s. l. the most explicit example of a complex of semi-cryptic and cryptic liverwort species. The temperate Frullania clades of this study likely went through recent extinction and expansion processes as indicated by the bottleneck pattern of genetic diversity. Species from tropical regions or regions with an Atlantic climate usually contain several geographical lineages. Our findings support frequent short-distance migration, rare successful long-distance dispersal events, extinction and recolonization as an explanation for the range formation in these Frullania species.
authors.affiliation: Georg August University, Albrecht-von-Haller-Institute of Plant Sciences, Department of Systematic Botany, Untere Karspüle 2, 37073 Göttingen, Germany. jheinri@uni-goettingen.de
authors.forename: Jochen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Heinrichs
authors.forename: Jörn
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hentschel
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bombosch
authors.forename: Anja
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fiebig
authors.forename: Judith
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Reise
authors.forename: Michel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Edelmann
authors.forename: Hans-Peter
authors.initials: HP
authors.lastname: Kreier
authors.forename: Alfons
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Schäfer-Verwimp
authors.forename: Steffen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Caspari
authors.forename: Alexander R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Schmidt
authors.forename: Rui-Liang
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.forename: Matthew
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: von Konrat
authors.forename: Blanka
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Shaw
authors.forename: A Jonathan
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Shaw
mesh_terms: D001499:Bayes Theorem; D002467:Cell Nucleus / Q000235:genetics; D018742:DNA, Chloroplast / Q000235:genetics; D018744:DNA, Plant / Q000235:genetics; D021903:DNA, Ribosomal Spacer / Q000235:genetics; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D005819:Genetic Markers; D049810:Genetic Speciation; D005843:Geography; D035926:Hepatophyta / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D010802:Phylogeny; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D018742:DNA, Chloroplast; D018744:DNA, Plant; D021903:DNA, Ribosomal Spacer; D005819:Genetic Markers