Climatic and biogeographic processes underlying the diversification of the pantropical flowering plant family Annonaceae.

Tropical forests harbor the richest biodiversity among terrestrial ecosystems, but few studies have addressed the underlying processes of species diversification in these ecosystems. We use the pantropical flowering plant family Annonaceae as a study system to investigate how climate and biogeographic events contribute to diversification. A super-matrix phylogeny comprising 835 taxa (34% of Annonaceae species) based on eight chloroplast regions was used in this study. We show that global temperature may better explain the recent rapid diversification in Annonaceae than time and constant models. Accelerated accumulation of niche divergence (around 15 Ma) lags behind the increase of diversification rate (around 25 Ma), reflecting a heterogeneous transition to recent diversity increases. Biogeographic events are related to only two of the five diversification rate shifts detected. Shifts in niche evolution nevertheless appear to be associated with increasingly seasonal environments. Our results do not support the direct correlation of any particular climatic niche shifts or historical biogeographical event with shifts in diversification rate. Instead, we suggest that Annonaceae diversification can lead to later niche divergence as a result of increasing interspecific competition arising from species accumulation. Shifts in niche evolution appear to be associated with increasingly seasonal environments. Our results highlight the complexity of diversification in taxa with long evolutionary histories.

Meiogyne oligocarpa (Annonaceae), a new species from Yunnan, China.

Meiogyne oligocarpa sp. nov. (Annonaceae) is described from Yunnan Province in Southwest China. It is easily distinguished from all previously described Meiogyne species by the possession of up to four carpels per flower, its bilobed, sparsely hairy stigma, biseriate ovules and cylindrical monocarps with a beaked apex. A phylogenetic analysis was conducted to confirm the placement of this new species within Meiogyne. Meiogyne oligocarpa represents the second species of Meiogyne in China: a key to the species of Meiogyne in China is provided to distinguish it from Meiogyne hainanensis. Paraffin sectioning was undertaken to study the anatomy of the corrugations on the inner petals of Meiogyne oligocarpa to verify whether they are glandular.

Specificity of assemblage, not fungal partner species, explains mycorrhizal partnerships of mycoheterotrophic Burmannia plants.

Mycoheterotrophic plants (MHPs) growing on arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) usually maintain specialized mycorrhizal associations. The level of specificity varies between MHPs, although it remains largely unknown whether interactions with mycorrhizal fungi differ by plant lineage, species, and/or by population. Here, we investigate the mycorrhizal interactions among Burmannia species (Burmanniaceae) with different trophic modes using high-throughput DNA sequencing. We characterized the inter- and intraspecific dynamics of the fungal communities by assessing the composition and diversity of fungi among sites. We found that fully mycoheterotrophic species are more specialized in their fungal associations than chlorophyllous species, and that this specialization possibly results from the gradual loss of some fungal groups. In particular, although many fungal species were shared by different Burmannia species, fully MHP species typically host species-specific fungal assemblages, suggesting that they have a preference for the selected fungi. Although no apparent cophylogenetic relationship was detected between fungi and plants, we observe that evolutionarily closely related plants tend to have a greater proportion of shared or closely related fungal partners. Our findings suggest a host preference and specialization toward fungal assemblages in Burmannia, improving understanding of interactions between MHPs and fungi.

Cropped, Drosophila transcription factor AP-4, controls tracheal terminal branching and cell growth.

BACKGROUND: Endothelial or epithelial cellular branching is vital in development and cancer progression; however, the molecular mechanisms of these processes are not clear. In Drosophila, terminal cell at the end of some tracheal tube ramifies numerous fine branches on the internal organs to supply oxygen. To discover more genes involved in terminal branching, we searched for mutants with very few terminal branches using the Kiss enhancer-trap line collection. RESULTS: In this analysis, we identified cropped (crp), encoding the Drosophila homolog of the transcription activator protein AP-4. Overexpressing the wild-type crp gene or a mutant that lacks the DNA-binding region in either the tracheal tissues or terminal cells led to a loss-of-function phenotype, implying that crp can affect terminal branching. Unexpectedly, the ectopic expression of cropped also led to enlarged organs, and cell-counting experiments on the salivary glands suggest that elevated levels of AP-4 increase cell size and organ size. Like its mammalian counterpart, cropped is controlled by dMyc, as ectopic expression of dMyc in terminal cells increased cellular branching and the Cropped protein levels in vivo. CONCLUSIONS: We find that the branching morphogenesis of terminal cells of the tracheal tubes in Drosophila requires the dMyc-dependent activation of Cropped/AP-4 protein to increase the cell growth of terminal cells.