Glacial refugia and speciation in a group of wind-pollinated and -dispersed, endemic Alpine species of Helictotrichon (Poaceae).

ABSTRACT: In the Alps phylogeographic studies indicate for small insect-pollinated herbs that climatic fluctuations caused significant population migrations and fragmentations into glacial refugia at the periphery of the Alps. Here we investigate whether this holds also for wind-pollinated and -dispersed species. We therefore analysed the phylogeographic pattern (nuclear and chloroplast dataset) of a clade of the four species of the Helictotrichon parlatorei species group (Poaceae) endemic to the Alps. In contrast to earlier findings for small insect-pollinated herbs no clear barriers to gene flow could be detected in this species group. Instead a few haplotypes are widespread across the entire Alpine region. While the complete absence of a phylogeographic structure in the plastid dataset hints towa

SUBMITTER: Ley AC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6188759 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature