Phylogenomic study of Xanthoparmelia (lichenized Ascomycota) in southern Africa
Southern Africa hosts a large portion of the global biodiversity of Xanthoparmelia (Parmeliaceae), the most speciose genus of lichen-forming fungi. Many of the ca. 350 Xanthoparmelia species known from South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, and Eswatini are endemic to the region, and the genus itself is believed to have originated in Africa near the Oligocene-Miocene boundary. Despite the importance of southern Africa for understanding global Xanthoparmelia biodiversity, only a small fraction of species from this region are currently represented with molecular data, and no genomes are available from either southern African endemics or widespread species that occur in the area. In this phylogenomics/museomics project, we analyze metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) for Xanthoparmelia species from southern Africa. These genomes were sequenced from herbarium specimens at the US National Herbarium (US), which hosts the world's most important collection of Xanthoparmelia due to the collecting efforts and taxonomic work of Mason E. Hale. All of the laboratory and data analysis were conducted in and with the support of the Laboratories of Analytical Biology (https://ror.org/05b8c0r92) of the National Museum of Natural History.