ABSTRACT
A taxonomic revision of the Old-World representatives of the fern genus Orthiopteris is presented. We recognize eight species, one of which is newly described (Orthiopterissamoensis), and five varieties, of which two are newly described (Orthiopteriscampyluravar.insularis and Orthiopteriscampyluravar.laxa). Orthiopterisacuminata, Orthiopteriscaudata, Orthiopterisminor and Orthiopteriskingii are all reduced to varieties of Orthiopteriscampylura.
ABSTRACT
A fern from the French Pyrenees-×Cystocarpium roskamianum-is a recently formed intergeneric hybrid between parental lineages that diverged from each other approximately 60 million years ago (mya; 95% highest posterior density: 40.2-76.2 mya). This is an extraordinarily deep hybridization event, roughly akin to an elephant hybridizing with a manatee or a human with a lemur. In the context of other reported deep hybrids, this finding suggests that populations of ferns, and other plants with abiotically mediated fertilization, may evolve reproductive incompatibilities more slowly, perhaps because they lack many of the premating isolation mechanisms that characterize most other groups of organisms. This conclusion implies that major features of Earth's biodiversity-such as the relatively small number of species of ferns compared to those of angiosperms-may be, in part, an indirect by-product of this slower "speciation clock" rather than a direct consequence of adaptive innovations by the more diverse lineages.
Subject(s)
Ferns/genetics , Genetic Speciation , Hybridization, Genetic , Biological Evolution , France , Molecular Sequence Data , Phylogeny , Reproduction , Sequence Analysis, ProteinABSTRACT
The Asiatic species of Oleandra (Oleandraceae) are revised. We reduce a large number of species to Oleandra neriiformis and Oleandra sibbaldii, we provide a revised circumscription of Oleandra cumingii and Oleandra undulata and we establish the identity of Oleandra vulpina. In total, we recognize 9 species, with full synonymy, descriptions and distribution maps. A list of identifications is appended.
