Scrophulariaceae is one of the families that has been divided extensively due to the results of DNA sequence studies. One of its segregates is a vastly enlarged Plantaginaceae. In a phylogenetic study of 47 members of Plantaginaceae and seven outgroups based on 3561 aligned characters from four DNA regions (the nuclear ribosomal ITS region and the plastid trnL-F, rps16 intron, and matKtrnK intron regions), the relationships within this clade were analyzed. The results from parsimony and Bayesian analyses support the removal of the Lindernieae from Gratioleae to a position outside Plantaginaceae. A group of mainly New World genera is paraphyletic with respect to a clade of Old World genera. Among the New World taxa, those offering oil as a pollinator reward cluster together. Ourisia is sister to this clade. Gratioleae consist of Gratiola, Otacanthus, Bacopa, Stemodia, Scoparia, and Mecardonia. Cheloneae plus Russelia and Tetranema together constitute the sister group to a clade predominantly composed of Old World taxa. Among the Old World clade, Ellisiophyllum and Lafuentea have been analyzed for the first time in a molecular phylogenetic analysis. The former genus is sister to Sibthorpia and the latter is surprisingly the sister to Antirrhineae.

https://bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.3732/ajb.92.2.297

Piecing together the "new" Plantaginaceae.

A molecular phylogenetic analysis of the Macaronesian endemic species of Convolvulus was undertaken using data from the nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) regions. The results of the analysis support two introductions into Macaronesia from distantly related clades within Convolvulus and a subsequent back-colonization to the continent from within one of the clades. Hypothesized relationships between Macaronesian species and New World taxa and between the Canarian endemic C. caput-medusae and the Moroccan C. trabutianus are refuted. Both Macaronesian clades are shown to have Mediterranean sister groups although one is predominantly western Mediterranean and the other predominantly eastern Mediterranean in distribution. The patterns of colonization into Macaronesia demonstrated by Convolvulus and also by other multiple colonizing genera conform to either a pattern of phylogenetic distinctiveness or a checkerboard distribution of island lineages. Both are consistent with the hypothesis that niche preemption is responsible for the limited number of colonizations into the region. A review of sister group relationships demonstrates that, in common with Convolvulus, most Macaronesian groups have sister groups distributed in the near-continent (i.e., western Mediterranean). Disjunct sister group relationships (including Eastern Mediterranean disjunctions) occur in only 18% of groups.

https://bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.3732/ajb.91.7.1070

Relationships of the Macaronesian and Mediterranean floras: molecular evidence for multiple colonizations into Macaronesia and back-colonization of the continent in Convolvulus (Convolvulaceae).

1 Large endemic plant taxa found on oceanic archipelagos are frequently monophyletic, indicating that they originate from a single colonization event. 2 Colonization is a two-stage process requiring both dispersal and establishment to be successful. Accordingly, once-only colonization may be explained either by dispersal barriers limiting colonization, or by the first successful colonization of an island inhibiting the establishment of later arrivals through niche pre-emption and interspecific competition. 3 Using the endemic flora of the Canaries and Macaronesia as a test case, I argue that barriers to dispersal are low and that niche pre-emption is therefore the more likely explanation for the monophyly of large endemic groups in these islands.

https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1365-2745.2004.00853.x

The ghost of competition past in the phylogeny of island endemic plants

The Gonosperminae (Asteraceae) are composed of three genera endemic to the Canary Islands (Gonospermum Less., and Lugoa DC.) and southern Africa (Inulanthera Kallersjo ¨), and they are considered an example of a floristic link between these two regions. Phylogenetic analyses of ITS sequences reveal that the Canarian genera are not sister to Inulanthera and do not support the monophyly of the Gonosperminae. These results, coupled with previous phylogenetic studies of other groups, suggest that many of the putative biogeographic links between Macaronesia and southeast Africa need to be evaluated by rigorous phylogenetic analyses. Inulanthera forms part of the basal southern African radiation of the Anthemideae, and therefore it is closely related to other taxa from this region. Maximum likelihood and weighted parsimony analyses support a monophyletic group in the Canary Islands, that includes Lugoa, Gonospermum, and three Tanacetum species endemic to the island of Gran Canaria. Bootstrap support for the monophyly of this Canarian group is weak, and it collapses in the strict consensus tree based on unweighted parsimony. Lugoa is nested within Gonos- permum, and both interisland colonization among the western islands of La Gomera, El Hierro, La Palma and Tenerife, and radiation on the central island of Gran Canaria have been the major patterns of species diversification for these Canarian endemics.

Origin and evolution of the endemic genera of Gonosperminae (Asteraceae: Anthemideae) from the Canary Islands: evidence from nucleotide sequences of the internal transcribed spacers of the nuclear ribosomal DNA.

The origin of the flora of the Macaronesian archipelagos has been a subject of controversy for over a century with the traditional opinion asserting that it is a relictual fragment of a widespread Tertiary subtropical European flora. A phylogenetic investigation of the three Macaronesian genera of the Bencomia alliance (Bencomia, Dendriopoterium, and Marcetella) using sequence data from the nuclear rDNA Transcribed Spacer region (ITS) has provided evidence relevant to the origin of the Macaronesian flora and the evolution of morphological characters of interest to students of island biology. In the ITS phylogeny, the Bencomia alliance, Sarcopoterium, a monotypic genus of the eastern Mediterranean, and Sanguisorba ancistroides, also a Mediterranean species, form a clade that is sister to the Eurasian Sanguisorba minor. These relationships contradict the relictual hypotheses and show that the endemic Macaronesian Rosaceae are sister to Mediterranean Sanguisorbeae. The data also contradict a recent ...

Manuel González-Martín

Papers

A new species of the wild dragon tree, Dracaena (Dracaenaceae) from Gran Canaria and its taxonomic and biogeographic implications