Phylogeographical inferences, applied in a comparative framework across multiple species at a regional scale, provide the means for detecting regional and landscape-level patterns of biodiversity, which are important for understanding macroecology and evolution in a geographical mosaic against a backdrop broadly impacted by geological events. Although information on Patagonian phylogeographical patterns has accumulated for both aquatic and terrestrial organisms in recent years, no attempt has been made to compare patterns across major organismal groups. In this review, we compiled studies on the phylogeography of co-distributed plants and terrestrial vertebrates from Patagonia. From each study, we extracted information on levels of genetic diversity, and inferred demographic processes and phylogeographical breaks, as well as on putative refugia, to produce the first summary of emerging phylogeographical patterns for this region. This review reveals some congruent phylogeographical patterns within and among plants and terrestrial vertebrates, and suggests that PreQuaternary as well as Quaternary geological events would have been important driving forces in the evolutionary history of Patagonian lineages. Different processes and directional range shifts suggest a mosaic of phylogeographical patterns, far more complex than the several north-south common patterns traditionally proposed.Las inferencias filogeográficas, dentro de un marco comparativo cuando incluyen varias especies a escala regional, permiten detectar patrones de biodiversidad regional y de paisaje (fisonómicos), importantes para entender tanto la macroecología como el impacto a gran escala de los eventos geológicos. En los últimos años, el conocimiento filogeográfico de Patagonia se ha acumulado para organismos acuáticos y terrestres, y aunque se han propuesto pocos patrones demográficos o espaciales cualitativamente concordantes, no se ha hecho ningún intento de revisar comparativamente algunos de esos patrones considerando grandes grupos de organismos. En esta revisión compilamos el conocimiento publicado sobre la filogeografía de plantas vasculares y vertebrados terrestres de Patagonia con el propósito de comparar niveles de diversidad genética, procesos demográficos, quiebres filogeográ-ficos y localización de posibles refugios, para producir el primer resumen de patrones filogeográficos emergentes

Aim We perform a phylogeographical study of an endemic Patagonian herbaceous plant to assess whether geographical patterns of genetic variation correspond to in situ Pleistocene survival or to glacial retreat and post-glacial expansion. We also seek to determine the locations of potential glacial refugia and post-glacial colonization routes.Location Southern Andes and Patagonian steppe.Methods We used Calceolaria polyrhiza, a widely distributed Patagonian herbaceous plant that occurs mainly in the understorey of Nothofagus rain forests and in the arid Patagonian steppe, as our model system. The chloroplast intergenic spacer trnH-psbA was sequenced for 590 individuals from 68 populations. Sequence data were analysed using phylogenetic (maximum parsimony, maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference) and population genetic (spatial analyses of molecular variance, mismatch distributions and neutrality tests) methods. Nested clade phylogeographic analyses, and divergence time estimates using a calibrated molecular clock, were also conducted.Results A total of 27 haplotypes identified in the present study clustered into four primary genealogical lineages, revealing three significant latitudinal phylogeographical breaks. The two high Andean lineages probably split first, during the late Miocene, and the Patagonian lineage split around 4 Ma, coincident with the establishment of the Patagonian steppe. Within each haplogroup, major diversification occurred in the Pleistocene. The Patagonian groups show a pattern consistent with a rapid post-glacial expansion and colonization of the Andean flanks, achieved independently by four lineages. The highest haplotype diversity was found along a longitudinal transect that is remarkably congruent with the limit of the ice-sheet extension during the Greatest Patagonian Glaciation. A north-east expansion is evident, which is probably associated with the 'Arid Diagonal' fluctuations.Main conclusions Glacial climate fluctuations had a substantial impact on the diversification, distribution and demography of the study species. A scenario of multiple periglacial Pleistocene refugia and subsequent multiple recolonization routes, from eastern Patagonia to the Andean flanks, may explain the phylogeographical patterns observed. However, current genetic structure also preserves the imprints of older events that probably occurred in the Miocene and Pliocene, providing evidence that multiple processes, operating at different spatial and temporal scales, have moulded biodiversity in Patagonia.