Cryptic species in the Andean hemiparasite Quinchamalium chilense (Schoepfiaceae: Santalales).

LOPEZ LAPHITZ, R. M.; EZCURRA, C.; VIDAL-RUSSELL, R.

SYSTEMATICS AND BIODIVERSITY

CAMBRIDGE UNIV PRESS

Lugar: Cambridge; Año: 2018 vol. 16 p. 260 - 270

1477-2000

The integration of different characters (e.g. morphological, ecological, and molecular) is now recognized as important inspecies delimitation. In particular, genetic distances between homologous genes have been suggested as one of the maintools to identify species, especially in the case of cryptic species. Quinchamalium is morphologically variable and occupiesa diverse set of biomes across its distribution in the Southern Andes. Recent work based on morphology has synonymizedthe entire genus as a single morphospecies, Quinchamalium chilense. This widely distributed taxon presents theopportunity to find potential cryptic species. The main objective of this study was to test the existence of cryptic species,based mainly on phylogenetic gene trees, genetic distances, and geographic patterns of haplotypes from molecular markersof the nuclear (ITS) and chloroplast (trnL-F) genomes, considering climatic and morphological characteristics. The ITSphylogeny and corresponding haplotype network resulted in three lineages with strong genetic differentiation and distinctgeographic patterns. These lineages were informally named Desert, Matorral, and Mountain, based on their geographicdistribution in different biomes. The trnL-F chloroplast phylogeny did not distinguish Desert from Matorral, and thehaplotype network showed overlap between these last two lineages. Overall, we hypothesize the existence of two crypticspecies within Quinchamalium chilense (Mountain and Matorral?Desert) that correspond to genetic, climatic, andmorphological differences.Key words: genetic divergence, molecular lineages, morphology, phylogeny, phylogeography, speciation