Background: At the last glacial maximum, Fennoscandia was covered by an ice sheet while the tundra occupied most of the rest of northern Eurasia. More or less disjunct refugial populations of plants were dispersed in southern Europe, often trapped between mountain ranges and seas. Genetic and paleobotanical evidences indicate that these populations have contributed much to Holocene recolonization of more northern latitudes. Less supportive evidence has been found for the existence of glacial populations located closer to the ice margin. Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) is a nordic conifer with a wide natural range covering much of Eurasia. Fractures in its extant genetic structure might be indicative of glacial vicariance and how different refugia contributed to the current distribution at the continental level. The population structure of Scots pine was investigated on much of its Eurasian natural range using maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA polymorphisms.

The phylogeny of the genus Picea was investigated by sequencing three loci from the paternally inherited chloroplast genome (trnK, rbcL and trnTLF) and the intron 2 of the maternally transmitted mitochondrial gene nad1 for 35 species. Significant topological differences were found between the trnK tree and the rbcL and trnTLF phylogenetic trees, and between cpDNA and mtDNA phylogenies. None of the phylogenies matched morphological classifications. The mtDNA phylogeny was geographically more structured than cpDNA phylogenies, reflecting the different inheritance of the two cytoplasmic genomes in the Pinaceae and their differential dispersion by seed only and seed and pollen, respectively. Most North American taxa formed a monophyletic group on the mtDNA tree, with topological patterns suggesting geographic speciation by range fragmentation or by dispersal and isolation. Similar patterns were also found among Asian taxa. Such a trend towards geographic speciation is anticipated in other Pinaceae genera with similar life history, autecology and reproductive system. Incongruences between organelle phylogenies suggested the occurrence of mtDNA capture by invading cpDNA. Incongruences between cpDNA partitions further suggested heterologous recombination presumably also linked to ancient reticulate evolution. Whilst cpDNA appears potentially valuable for molecular taxonomy and systematics purposes, these results emphasize the reduced value of cpDNA to infer vertical descent and the speciation history for plants with paternal transmission and high dispersal of their chloroplast genome.

Aim Tamarack (Larix laricina) is an early-successional transcontinental boreal conifer occurring within the spruce-fir dominated forest. The aim was to infer the species biogeographical history and to assess the putative genetic imprint left by interspecific competition during post-glacial migration, using cytoplasmic DNA and fossil data.Location Forty-five locations were sampled across the transcontinental range spanning the North American boreal forest.Methods A total of 621 trees were scanned for mitochondrial and chloroplast DNA polymorphisms to reveal geographical patterns of genetic diversity, differentiation, and population structure throughout the species range. Published pollen records were analysed to assess the chronology of post-glacial colonization of Larix sp. relative to more competitive tree taxa, Picea sp. and Abies sp..Results Genotyping resulted in two mitotypes (one locus) and 24 chlorotypes (three cpSSR loci). Bayesian assignment test based on cpDNA data detected three groups: eastern North America, western North America and Alaska. CpDNA population differentiation was higher in the western part of the range relative to the eastern part. Post-glacial colonization chronology derived from fossil data indicated that Larix colonized western North America at least 4000 years after Picea and Abies, but shortly preceded them in eastern North America.Main conclusions Cytoplasmic and fossil data provided support for four distinct glacial lineages. Two lineages would have persisted south of the Laurentide ice sheet, while the two remaining ones likely originate from northern refugia located in Beringia and Labrador. Larix establishment was possibly hindered by earlier establishment of more competitive taxa in western North America, which resulted in high genetic differentiation among western populations. These results provide support for a putative role of interspecific competition in structuring the standing genetic variation at the time of post-glacial colonization.

Canada yew (Taxus canadensis Marsh.) is a gymnosperm that grows in the understory of mixed and deciduous forests of northeastern North America. This shrub had no economic importance until the discovery of paclitaxel, or TAXOL®, which is a compound found in plant tissue and used in cancer treatment. With the intensifying harvesting pressure on natural populations of this species, the natural gene pool might be affected. The objective of this study was to estimate the levels of genetic diversity and population structure in Canada yew, before any sizeable effects resulting from harvesting appear. Six natural populations of Canada yew were sampled in Quebec. Genetic diversity was estimated at 22 loci coding for 12 enzyme systems. At the population level, the number of alleles per locus was 1.32, the percentage of polymorphic loci was 26.5%, and the observed heterozygosity was 0.102. These results show that Canada yew is genetically less diverse than other yew species and the great majority of gymnosperms. However, the amount of population differentiation was substantially higher (FST = 10.2%) than that for other conifer and tree species growing in the boreal-temperate zone. Hypotheses related to the biogeography of the species and a likely metapopulation structure are proposed to explain the observed trends.

No abstract