REE, RICHARD. Harvard University Herbaria, Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, 22 Divinity Ave., Cambridge, MA 02138. - Floral diversity and phylogeny of Pedicularis.
Pedicularis is a lineage of approximately 700 species of
hemiparasitic angiosperms that has radiated extensively in the eastern
Himalayan biodiversity "hot spot" of south-central China.
This group displays substantial variation in floral morphology:
corollas can be beaked, crested, toothed, and/or long-tubed. New
molecular phylogenies of Himalayan Pedicularis resolve a
long-standing source of conflict in systematic treatments regarding
the use of floral versus vegetative characters in identifying primary
subgeneric lineages, corroborate existing hypotheses about patterns of
character evolution in the corolla, and raise intriguing questions
about the role of pollinators in mediating the origin and maintenance
of diversity in this group.
Key words: China, Himalaya, homoplasy, Pedicularis, phylogeny