Message - 7th IAL Symposium

The 7th International Association for Lichenology Symposium 2012
4A: Evolution and Systematics in the Teloschistales
(4A-O1) Submission ID: IAL0253-00001
SYSTEMATICS AND EVOLUTION WITHIN THE ORDER TELOSCHISTALES AND FAMILY
TELOSCHISTACEAE (ASCOMYCOTA, FUNGI) WITH A MULTI-LOCUS
SUPERMATRIX APPROACH
Gaya E. 1 , Högnabba F. 2 , Ramírez-Mejía M. 1,3 , Holguín A. 3 , Molnar K. 4 , Fernández-Brime S. 5 , Stenroos S. 2 ,
Arup U. 6 , Søchting U. 7 , Van Den Boom P. 8 , Lücking R. 9 , Vargas R. 10 , Sipman H. 11 , Lutzoni F. 1
1 Department of Biology, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, United States
2 Botanical Museum, Finnish Museum of Natural History, University of Helsinki, Finland
3 Department of Biology, Universidad de Los Andes, Bogotà, Colombia
4 Institute of Ecology and Botany, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Vacratot, Hungary
5 Department of Plant Biology (Botany Unit), Facultat de Biologia, Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
6 Botanical Museum, Lund University, Lund, Sweden
7 Section of Ecology and Evolution, Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
8 Arafura 16,NL-5691 JA Son, Netherlands
9 Department of Botany, The Field Museum, Chicago, Illinois, United States
10 Department of Botany, Universidad de Concepcion, Concepcion, Chile
11 Botanischer Garten und Botanisches Museum Berlin-Dahlem, Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany
The resolution of the phylogenetic relationships within the order Teloschistales (Lecanoromycetidae,
Ascomycota), currently with nearly 2,000 known species and an outstanding phenotypic diversity, has been
hindered by the limitation in the resolving power that a single-locus or two-locus phylogenetic studies have provided
up do date. In this context, an extensive taxon sampling within the Teloschistales with more loci (especially
nuclear protein-coding genes) were needed to confront the current taxonomic delimitations and to improve our
understanding of evolutionary trends within this order. The present study assessed this issue using maximum
likelihood and Bayesian analyses with complementary bootstrap support values and posterior probabilities based
on seven loci using a supermatrix approach, and including protein-coding genes RPB1 and RPB2 apart from
nuclear and mitochondrial ribosomal loci. Although the progressive addition of taxa with missing data did not
dramatically affect the loss of support and resolution, the monophyly of the Teloschistales in the current sense was
inconsistent, depending on the loci-taxa combination analyzed. Based on these results we propose a new, but
provisional, classification for the re-circumscribed orders Caliciales and Teloschistales. We report here that the
family Brigantiaeaceae and Sipmaniella are members of the Teloschistales in a strict sense. The position of CIoplaca
and Josefpoeltia within the Teloschistaceae is confirmed by molecular phylogenetics. Within the Teloschistales,
one lineage led to the diversification of the mostly epiphytic crustose Brigantiaeaceae and Letrouitiaceae, with a
circumpacific center of diversity and found mostly in the tropics. The other main lineage led to another epiphytic
crustose family, mostly tropical, and with an Australasian center of diversity – the Megalosporaceae – which is
sister to the mainly rock-inhabiting, cosmopolitan, and species rich Teloschistaceae, with a diversity of growth
habits ranging from crustose to fruticose. Additionally, we are presenting a comprehensive phylogeny for the
family Teloschistaceae with new loci selected from AFToL2, and a first exploration of the evolution of phenotypic
traits and an in-depth characterization for a major taxonomic redelimitation of genera within this family.
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