Title
Using a new RAD-sequencing approach to study the evolution of Micromeria in the Canary islands
Date Issued
01 February 2018
Access level
metadata only access
Resource Type
journal article
Author(s)
Curto M.
Schachtler C.
Meimberg H.
University of Porto
Publisher(s)
Academic Press Inc.
Abstract
As found in other oceanic islands, the Canary Islands include a large number of single island endemic species, some of which form clades that are broadly distributed within the archipelago. The genus Micromeria (Lamiaceae), for instance, includes groups of morphologically similar but ecologically diverse species on each island, representing a great model to investigate niche shifts and adaptation within the Canary Archipelago. Previous attempts to reconstruct phylogenetic relationships within the genus did not lead to robust phylogenies, presumably due to introgression and/or incomplete lineage sorting. In this study, we use a newly developed RAD-sequencing method to improve phylogenetic resolution and to better understand relationships among the Canary Island endemic Micromeria. Overall, we obtained 3571 loci that were genotyped for a total of 46 individuals of Micromeria. Our data reconstructed a highly resolved phylogeny, and corroborated the latest species reclassification of the M. varia s.l. species complex, the taxonomically most complicated group within the genus. Furthermore, taxa occupying similar ecological conditions in different islands, were shown to be closely related. This is the case of taxa from the laurel forest from La Gomera and Gran Canaria, suggesting that the laurel forest likely worked as a filter, only allowing the establishment of colonizers already pre-adapted to these conditions. We also found introgression between these species so it is also possible that the genes that facilitated the adaptation to laurel forest were swapped between Gran Canaria and La Gomera. The observations obtained in this study also allowed us to explain the role of introgression in the origin of M. varia s.l. species complex.
Start page
160
End page
169
Volume
119
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Biología (teórica, matemática, térmica, criobiología, ritmo biológico), Biología evolutiva Biología
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-85035041632
PubMed ID
Source
Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution
ISSN of the container
10557903
Sponsor(s)
The authors would like to thank Sarah Sturm for technical assistance and Andreas Brachmann for guidance during library preparation and sequencing. We also thank Saurabh Dilip Pophaly and Peter Sykacek for help with data analyses and Papius Tibihika for proof reading the manuscript. We thank Günter Heubl for providing some of the samples used in this study. All samples used in this study were used in earlier studies and collected under permits from the University of La Laguna, with the assistance from P. Perez de Paz. This research was supported by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) through a research grant to H.M. (PTDC/BIA-BEC/108866/2008 and PTDC/BIA-BEC/098596/2008), and PhD scholarships to M.C. (SFRH/BD/79010/2011) and P.P. (SFRH/BD/74747/2010). Both grants attributed to H.M. were co-funded by the Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER) through COMPETE – Programa Operacional Fatores de Competitividade (POFC) (grants FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-008988 and FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-008900, respectively). Furthermore, P.P. research is also supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No 668981. Finally, we would like to thank the anonymous reviewers and especially the associate editor for their comments and suggestions.
Sources of information: Directorio de Producción Científica Scopus