Phylogeographic studies of plants in China: Advances in the past and directions in the future

By Jianquan Liu, Yongshuai Sun, X. Ge, Lianming Gao, Yingxiong Qiu. 2012

227 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Abstract  Phylogeography has been one major focus of evolutionary biology in recent years, with many important advances in Chinese species. In this issue, we collected 11 phylogeographic studies of plants by Chinese laboratories. We further synthesized the main findings and patterns emerging from these and previous phylogeographic studies in China and asked where phylogeographic research should be directed in the coming years. Numerous examples have shown that phylogeographic patterns in China did not show an expected expansion–contraction pattern at large scale, mirroring the geological records showing that no unified ice sheet had developed in China during the Quaternary Period. Instead, regional expansions and intraspecific divergences are very common in most studied species during the Quaternary oscillations. Different intraspecific lineages or alleles (haplotypes) were detected in multiple localized refugia, from where regional or local expansions are likely to have started. Hybridizations and introgressions are frequent between intraspecific lineages or between different species. We also reviewed computational methods for phylogeographic analyses. Despite the great progress made in recent years, there remains much to discover about the spatial–temporal dimensions and underlying speciation mechanisms of Chinese plants. Phylogeographic studies represent a key knot that connects the genus phylogeny (macroevolution) and speciation and adaptation (microevolution). Therefore, we advocate that: (i) phylogeographic studies of plants in China should be directed to the closely related species or a monophyletic group (for example, a genus or a section) in the coming years; and (ii) population genetic data based on direct sequencing multiple loci, especially those from nuclear genome and statistical tests should be widely adopted and enforced. The recovered intraspecific divergences and phylogeographic patterns of multiple‐species may allow us to better understand the high plant diversity in China and set up concrete hypotheses for studying plant speciation and diversification mechanisms in this region.

Subfields: Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics, Genetics, Molecular Biology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/3205530264e0931386ae968695dff61e094a12ca

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics

1. W. Durka
2. H. Comes

In Genetics

1. Hang Sun
2. Kangshan Mao
3. W. Durka
4. K. He
5. Jianquan Liu
6. Xiaoyong Chen
7. Jian‐Feng Huang
8. Mingli Zhang

In Molecular Biology

1. Hang Sun
2. W. Durka
3. K. He
4. Jianquan Liu
5. Xiaoyong Chen
6. Xuelong Jiang
7. E. Welk
8. S. Michalski

Citations in the corpus

• Shifts in plant distributions in response to climate warming in a biodiversity hotspot, the Hengduan Mountains (2018, background): “…from higher elevations may have retreated to glacial refugia at lower elevations along the longitudinal range-gorge of the Hengduan Mountains, while during warm periods during the interglacial or post-glacial stages, these species would have shifted back to the higher elevations (Liu et al., 2012).”
• Evolutionary origin of species diversity on the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau (2021, background): “Overall, the available lines of evidence from phylogeographic studies (e.g., Wang et al., 2009; Liu et al., 2012a) to geological investigations (Owen & Dortch, 2014) reject a huge ice sheet on the QTPsl although such a dispute/debate may continue for a long time in the future and still needs…”
• Evolutionary history of the subnival flora of the Himalaya‐Hengduan Mountains: first insights from comparative phylogeography of four perennial herbs (2016, background): “Over the last years, the Hengduan sky islands and adjacent highlands (QTP, eastern Himalayas) have received considerable attention from plant phylogeographers investigating island-like adaptive radiation and intra-specific lineage diversification (Qiu et al., 2011; Liu et al., 2012).”
• Phylogeography of a widespread Asian subtropical tree: genetic east–west differentiation and climate envelope modelling suggest multiple glacial refugia (2014, background): “…have revealed multiple isolated refugia within subtropical China that are located outside of the predicted refugia of subtropical vegetation (Liu et al., 2012), mainly in the mountain regions of the Yunnan– Guizhou (Yungui) Plateau (Shen et al., 2005), the Nanling Mountains and the far east…”
• Sky islands of southwest China. I: an overview of phylogeographic patterns (2014, background): “However, they may have served as corridors and/or refugia during glacial periods [85].”
• Evolutionary history and underlying adaptation of alpine plants on the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau (2014, background): “For example, Wen et al. (2014) summarized the evolutionary histories of plant diversification, and Liu et al. (2012) reviewed the phylogeographic studies of plants in this region.”
• Plant phylogeography in arid Northwest China: Retrospectives and perspectives (2015, background): “By contrast, based on ecological niche modeling, N. sphaerocarpa indicated that populations had a shrunken and more fragmented range during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) (Su & Zhang, 2013).”