Plant Diversity ›› 2022, Vol. 44 ›› Issue (01): 83-93.DOI: 10.1016/j.pld.2021.06.007

• Articles • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Mojiangia oreophila (Crepidinae, Cichorieae, Asteraceae), a new species and genus from Mojiang County, SW Yunnan, China, and putative successor of the maternal Faberia ancestor

Zhi-Jian Yina, Ze-Huan Wangb, Norbert Kilianc, Ying Liud, Hua Penge, Ming-Xu Zhaoa   

  1. a China Forest Exploration and Design Institute in Kunming, Kunming, 650200, Yunnan, China;
    b Department of Medicinal Plants and Cultivation, College of Pharmacy, Guizhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Guiyang, 550025, China;
    c Botanischer Garten und Botanisches Museum Berlin, Freie Universität Berlin, Königin-Luise-Str. 6-8, 14195, Berlin, Germany;
    d CAS State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol and Guangdong Key Laboratory of Plant Resources, School of Life Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, 510275, China;
    e Key Laboratory for Plant Diversity and Biogeography of East Asia, Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, 650201, China
  • Received:2020-09-09 Revised:2021-06-15 Online:2022-02-25 Published:2022-03-12
  • Contact: Norbert Kilian
  • Supported by:
    The authors are grateful to the staff of KUN and the Institute of Cultivation and Processing of Chinese Medicinal Materials for research facilities. The use of high-performance computing resources at the Scientific Computing Service of the Freie Universität Berlin is also gratefully acknowledged. This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 31500168) and specific funds for the Fourth National Survey on Chinese Materia Medica Resources (GZY-KJS-2018-004). Finally, we would like to thank the Editors and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on earlier versions of this paper.

Abstract: A single small population of chasmophytic plants is described as Mojiangia oreophila, a monotypic genus in the subtribe Crepidinae, characterised by a unique combination of morphological features, in particular densely long-papillose homomorphic achenes with five main ribs each accompanied by two secondary ribs, coarse brownish pappus bristles, moderately many-flowered capitula, a small involucre with numerous outer phyllaries, perennial rosette herb growth and brown-woolly caudex and leaf axils. Molecular phylogenetic analysis detected that in the nrITS phylogeny M. oreophila forms a clade of its own in the Crepidinae; in the plastid DNA phylogeny it is nested in the clade formed by the hybridogenous genus Faberia, the maternal ancestor of which comes from the Crepidinae and the paternal ancestor from the Lactucinae, where Faberia is placed in nrITS phylogenies. M. oreophila shares several morphological features with Faberia and also shares the expected chromosome number of 2n=16 with its hitherto unknown maternal ancestor. M. oreophila may therefore be a successor of the maternal ancestor of Faberia. Alternatively, cytonuclear discordance is to be assumed in Mojiangia, caused by chloroplast capture as a result of hybridisation and introgression with Faberia.

Key words: Asteraceae, Crepidinae, Phylogeny, Taxonomy, Reticulate evolution, Cytonuclear discordance