Phylogenetic relationships of neotropical species of the genus Pohlia (Bryophyta)

GUILLERMO M. SUÁREZ

Tucumán, Argentina

Otro; XXVI Meeting of the Willy Henning Society; 2008

Willy Henning Society

Pohlia is a genus of Bryaceae that includes 127 species distributed worldwide; its Neotropical representatives are distributed along the Andean corridor. Little is known about these species, besides the original descriptions. Shaw (1984) suggested the monophyly of the genus based on morphological data and divided the genus in three subgenera: Nyholmiella, Mniobryum and Pohlia, the former group formed by Neotropical species. However his analysis included only 5 of the 36 Neotropical species. The aim of this study is to test the monophyly of the Neotropical species, through the study of gametophytic and sporophytic generations of all Neotropical species. A phylogenetic analysis was performed by parsimony under both equal and implied weightings (with concavities ranging between 2 to 100). In all the analysis Pohlia (including Mniobryum and Webera) was paraphyletic, in terms of some Leptobryum wilsonii. In addition, none of the subgeneric divisions were confirmed. In all the analyses L. wilsonii was included in the polisetous group of Pohlia. Concluding, our results suggest the non-monophyly of the Neotropical species of the genus Pohlia. Future work including more taxa and characters are desirable, to test our results.