The "cagaita tree" (Eugenia dysenterica) is a plant found widespread in the Brazilian Cerrado. Its fruit is used for popular consumption and for industrial purposes. This study opens a new perspective for the generation of population genetic data and parameters estimates for devising sound collection and conservation procedures for Eugenia dysenterica. A battery of 356 primer pairs developed for Eucalyptus spp. was tested on the "cagaita tree". Only 10 primer pairs were found to be transferable between the two species. Using a polyacrilamide gel, an average of 10.4 alleles per locus was detected, in a sample of 116 individuals from 10 natural "cagaita tree" populations. Seven polymorphic loci allowed estimation of genetic parameters, including expected average heterozygosity H e = 0,442, among population diversity, R ST = 0,268 and gene flow Nm = 0,680. Results indicated a potential of SSR locus transferability developed for Eucalyptus to other species of different genera, such as in the case of the "cagaita tree". The high genetic diversity among populations detected with SSR markers indicated that these markers are highly sensitive to detect population structure. Estimated Nm values and the existence of private alleles indicated reduced gene flow and consequently possible damage to the metapopulation structure.

O trabalho objetivou caracterizar árvores e frutos de populações naturais de Hancornia speciosa Gomes, bem como avaliar a distribuição da variabilidade fenotípica existente. Populações de mangabeiras foram amostradas no Cerrado, incluindo os Estados de Goiás, Tocantins, Mato Grosso, Mato Grosso do Sul e Bahia, abrangendo 109 matrizes de 35 populações das variedades botânicas pubescens, gardneri, speciosa e cuyabensis. Os resultados mostraram que, nas condições do Cerrado, as matrizes de H. speciosa apresentam elevados níveis de variação fenotípica quanto a caracteres de frutos, sendo que a maioria dessas variações está entre populações. Há, também, uma grande variação fenotípica dentro das variedades botânicas. H. speciosa var. gardneri e H. speciosa var. pubescens têm frutos maiores e mais pesados. A variedade botânica gardneri apresenta porte mais alto que as demais. Nas variedades gardneri e pubescens, predominam frutos redondos e verde-claros, enquanto em speciosa e cuyabensis predominam frutos de formato oblongo e coloração amarelo-escura e verde-escura, respectivamente. As variedades gardneri e pubescens destacam-se como de maior potencial para a seleção baseada em caracteres de tamanho e massa dos frutos.

Dentre as espécies frutíferas do bioma cerrado destaca-se a cagaiteira (Eugenia dysenterica DC., Myrtaceae), cujos frutos são consumidos in natura ou processados. Os frutos, folhas e casca apresentam propriedades medicinais, a madeira é utilizada em pequenas construções e carvão. Objetivou-se caracterizar frutos e árvores da espécie por amostragem de populações de plantas existentes no Sudeste de Goiás. Coletaram-se 1344 frutos de 112 plantas de 10 sub-populações para caracterização física dos mesmos e dados de 95 árvores, visando a sua descrição morfológica. Constatou-se variação significativa ao nível de 1% de probabilidade entre as 112 plantas para todos os caracteres de fruto, assim como entre plantas dentro de subpopulação e entre as médias de subpopulações. A média para a variável peso de fruto e número de sementes por fruto foi de 12,67g e 1,70, respectivamente. Os valores máximos e mínimos encontrados para a variável altura de planta foram, respectivamente, 11,0 m e 4,10 m e para diâmetro de copa foram de 10,30 m e 1,80m.

Systematic Conservation Planning (SCP) involves a series of steps that should be accomplished to determine the most cost-effective way to invest in conservation action. Although SCP has been usually applied at the species level (or hierarchically higher), it is possible to use alleles from molecular analyses at the population level as basic units for analyses. Here we demonstrate how SCP procedures can be used to establish optimum strategies for in situ and ex situ conservation of a single species, using Dipteryx alata (a Fabaceae tree species widely distributed and endemics to Brazilian Cerrado) as a case study. Data for the analyses consisted in 52 alleles from eight microsatellite loci coded for a total of 644 individual trees sampled in 25 local populations throughout species' geographic range. We found optimal solutions in which seven local populations are the smallest set of local populations of D. alata that should be conserved to represent the known genetic diversity. Combining these several solutions allowed estimating the relative importance of the local populations for conserving all known alleles, taking into account the current land-use patterns in the region. A germplasm collection for this species already exists, so we also used SCP approach to identify the smallest number of populations that should be further collected in the field to complement the existing collection, showing that only four local populations should be sampled for optimizing the species ex situ representation. The initial application of the SCP methods to genetic data showed here can be a useful starting point for methodological and conceptual improvements and may be a first important step towards a comprehensive and balanced quantitative definition of conservation goals, shedding light to new possibilities for in situ and ex situ designs within species.

Genetic effects of habitat fragmentation may be undetectable because they are generally a recent event in evolutionary time or because of confounding effects such as historical bottlenecks and historical changes in species' distribution. To assess the effects of demographic history on the genetic diversity and population structure in the Neotropical tree Dipteryx alata (Fabaceae), we used coalescence analyses coupled with ecological niche modeling to hindcast its distribution over the last 21 000 years. Twenty-five populations (644 individuals) were sampled and all individuals were genotyped using eight microsatellite loci. All populations presented low allelic richness and genetic diversity. The estimated effective population size was small in all populations and gene flow was negligible among most. We also found a significant signal of demographic reduction in most cases. Genetic differentiation among populations was significantly correlated with geographical distance. Allelic richness showed a spatial cline pattern in relation to the species' paleodistribution 21 kyr BP (thousand years before present), as expected under a range expansion model. Our results show strong evidences that genetic diversity in D. alata is the outcome of the historical changes in species distribution during the late Pleistocene. Because of this historically low effective population size and the low genetic diversity, recent fragmentation of the Cerrado biome may increase population differentiation, causing population decline and compromising long-term persistence.

-This study was carried out to assess the genetic variability of ten "cagaita" tree (Eugenia dysenterica) populations in Southeastern Goiás. Fifty-four randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) loci were used to characterize the population genetic variability, using the analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA). A φ ST value of 0.2703 was obtained, showing that 27.03% and 72.97% of the genetic variability is present among and within populations, respectively. The Pearson correlation coefficient (r) among the genetic distances matrix (1 -Jaccard similarity index) and the geographic distances were estimated, and a strong positive correlation was detected. Results suggest that these populations are differentiating through a stochastic process, with restricted and geographic distribution dependent gene flow.Index terms: Myrtaceae, Cerrado, tropical species, genetic diversity. Estrutura genética e fluxo gênico em populações naturais de cagaitaResumo -Este trabalho teve por objetivo o estudo da variabilidade genética em 10 populações de cagaiteiras (Eugenia dysenterica), da região Sudeste do Estado de Goiás. Foram identificados 54 locos marcadores RAPD, para a caracterização da variabilidade genética, avaliada por meio da análise da variância molecular (AMOVA). Foi verificado que 27,03% da variabilidade genética está entre populações, e 72,97% dentro de populações, índices obtidos a partir do valor de φ ST igual a 0,2703. Foi estimado o coeficiente de correlação de Pearson (r) entre a matriz de distâncias genéticas (1 -índice de similaridade de Jaccard) e de distâncias geográficas, tendo sido encontrada forte correlação positiva. Os resultados sugerem que essas populações estão se diferenciando por um processo estocástico havendo fluxo restrito dependente da distribuição geográfica.Termos para indexação: Myrtaceae, Cerrado, espécies tropicais, diversidade genética, Eugenia dysenterica.

We analyzed the fl oristics and phytosociology of three palm swamps in the municipality of Bela Vista de Goiás, located in the state of Goiás, Brazil, in the central part of the Brazilian savanna (Cerrado). Th e fl oristic surveys were conducted monthly from May 2008 to April 2009, and 310 species were recorded (seven bryophytes, 15 ferns and 288 angiosperms). Bryophytes belonged to fi ve genera and fi ve families; ferns belonged to nine genera and nine families; and angiosperms belonged to 134 genera and 45 families. Th e angiosperm families with the highest species richness were Poaceae, Cyperaceae, Asteraceae, Eriocaulaceae, Xyridaceae, Lentibulariaceae, Melastomataceae, Rubiaceae and Fabaceae. Th e palm swamps were divided into three zones of increasing humidity: edge, middle and core. Th e number of species was higher in the middle than at the edge and the core. Th e families with the highest cover values were Cyperaceae, Melastomataceae, Arecaceae and Poaceae. Although the palm swamps had been disturbed to varying degrees, those disturbances did not aff ect the fl ora in the middle or the core. Floristic similarity was high between these two zones within a given palm swamp and low between the edges of diff erent palm swamps. Acta Botanica Brasilica 27(1): 205-225. 2013. IntroductionWetlands are environments in which water is the determining factor of abiotic and biotic conditions (Keddy 2000, Steinke & Saito 2008. Th ese areas support several typical animal and plant species and foster a large number of ecological processes that sustain those species (Maltchik et al. 2003), making wetlands some of the most productive environments on the planet (Steinke & Saito 2008).In the Brazilian savanna (Cerrado), despite the dominance of phytophysiognomies on well-drained soils, wetlands such as palm swamps also occur (Meireles et al. 2002). Palm swamps are communities composed of a continuous herb-grass layer, which occupies most of their area, and a tree-shrub layer dominated by individuals of the palm Mauritia fl exuosa L. f. (local name, buriti), with a canopy cover of between 5% and 10% (Ribeiro & Walter 2008).In addition to the diversity of plant species (Araújo et al. 2002, Guimarães et al. 2002, palm swamps present some distinct micro-ecosystems in which there are some plant-animal interactions that are still poorly understood (Oliveira et al. 2009). Th ese environments serve as refuges, food sources and reproduction sites for the aquatic and terrestrial fauna of the adjacent phytophysiognomies (Guimarães et al. 2002). Th ey are also sites of great scenic beauty with economic and sustainable potential for ecotourism and for extractivism involving species such as M. fl exuosa and Syngonanthus nitens (Bong.) Ruhland (capim-dourado, which means "golden grass") by small rural communities (Schmidt et al. 2008).Palm swamps are categorized as areas of permanent preservation, for ensuring the maintenance of springs and the quality of watercourses (Araújo et al. 2002). Although legally protected, palm swamps ha...

The Brazilian Cerrado (Savannah) is a biome with great biodiversity. Many of the species found in this biome have unlimited economic potential and are used by the local population for various purposes. With the opening of the agricultural frontiers in this region, much of the native flora has been replaced by extensive areas of monocultures. Thirteen populations of the Eugenia dysenterica DC species were sampled in the northeast of the state of Goiás, Brazil, to analyze their genetic structure. Morphological traits were measured for all the progeny obtained and some of them were analyzed by using RAPD markers. The natural populations of the species showed high levels of variability for the morphological traits. The phenotypic, genotypic and genetic variabilities as structured in these populations were highly significant among populations, although most of the variability was detected within populations. The phenotypic and genetic variabilities were structured spatially as shown by the positive and highly significant correlation coefficients between the phenotypic and genetic distance matrixes and the geographic distance matrix. The ideal conservation strategy for the species in the region requires sampling of a high number of individuals of each population and also a significant number of populations to ensure suitable effective population sizes.