Premium
Arctic plant origins and early formation of circumarctic distributions: a case study of the mountain sorrel, Oxyria digyna
Author(s) -
Wang Qian,
Liu Jianquan,
Allen Geraldine A.,
Ma Yazhen,
Yue Wei,
Marr Kendrick L.,
Abbott Richard J.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
new phytologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.742
H-Index - 244
eISSN - 1469-8137
pISSN - 0028-646X
DOI - 10.1111/nph.13568
Subject(s) - arctic , pleistocene , plateau (mathematics) , geography , population , phylogeography , period (music) , physical geography , ecology , oceanography , geology , biology , archaeology , demography , mathematical analysis , biochemistry , physics , mathematics , sociology , gene , acoustics , phylogenetic tree
Summary Many plant species comprising the present‐day Arctic flora are thought to have originated in the high mountains of North America and Eurasia, migrated northwards as global temperatures fell during the late Tertiary period, and thereafter attained a circumarctic distribution. However, supporting evidence for this hypothesis that provides a temporal framework for the origin, spread and initial attainment of a circumarctic distribution by an arctic plant is currently lacking. Here we examined the origin and initial formation of a circumarctic distribution of the arctic mountain sorrel ( Oxyria digyna ) by conducting a phylogeographic analysis of plastid and nuclear gene DNA variation. We provide evidence for an origin of this species in the Qinghai‐Tibet Plateau of southwestern China, followed by migration into Russia c . 11 million yr ago (Ma), eastwards into North America by c . 4 Ma, and westwards into Western Europe by c . 1.96 Ma. Thereafter, the species attained a circumarctic distribution by colonizing Greenland from both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. Following the arrival of the species in North America and Europe, population sizes appear to have increased and then stabilized there over the last 1 million yr. However, in Greenland a marked reduction followed by an expansion in population size is indicated to have occurred during the Pleistocene.