AOBPreview originally published online on May 16, 2006
Annals of Botany 2006 98(1):245-256; doi:10.1093/aob/mcl095
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Phylogeny and Classification of Paris (Melanthiaceae) Inferred from DNA Sequence Data
1 Laboratory of Biogeography and Biodiversity, Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Heilongtan, Kunming, Yunnan, 650204, China, 2 Department of Botany, California Academy of Sciences, 875 Howard Street, San Francisco, CA 94103, USA and 3 Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, University of North Carolina, School of Medicine, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA
* For correspondence. E-mail pfritsch{at}calacademy.org or liheng{at}mail.kib.ac.cn
Received: 22 December 2005 Returned for revision: 1 February 2006 Accepted: 20 March 2006 Published electronically: 16 May 2006
• Background and Aims Paris (Melanthiaceae) is a temperate genus of about 24 perennial herbaceous species distributed from Europe to eastern Asia. The delimitation of the genus and its subdivisions are unresolved questions in the taxonomy of Paris. The objective of this study is to test the generic and infrageneric circumscription of Paris with DNA sequence data.
• Methods Phylogenetic analysis of 21 species of Paris based on nuclear ITS and plastid psbA-trnH and trnL-trnF DNA sequence data, alone and in combination, was employed to assess previous classifications.
• Key Results Paris is monophyletic in all analyses. Neither of the two traditionally recognized subgenera (Paris and Daiswa) are monophyletic. Sections Axiparis, Kinugasa, Paris and Thibeticae are monophyletic in only some of the analyses. Species of sections Dunnianae, Fargesianae and Marmoratae are consistently intercalated among species of section Euthyra in all analyses. Strong discordance between nuclear and plastid lineages is detected.
• Conclusions The data support the classification of Paris as a single genus rather than as three genera (Daiswa, Kinugasa and Paris sensu stricto). They provide justification for the transfer of section Axiparis from subgenus Paris to subgenus Daiswa and for the combination of sections Dunnianae, Fargesianae and Marmoratae into section Euthyra. The nuclear-plastid discordance is interpreted as the result of interspecific hybridization among sympatric species.
Key words: Classification, ITS, Melanthiaceae, nuclear-plastid incongruence, Parideae, Paris, phylogeny, psbA-trnH, trnL-trnF