JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. The University of Chicago Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to International Journal of Plant Sciences.Dryopteridaceae are a large family of leptosporangiate ferns exhibiting a rich diversity of morphological characteristics and generating many taxonomical controversies. Previous efforts to systematize this large group without a cladistic phylogenetic framework have not reached a consensus on circumscription of the family. In order to circumscribe the family and identify major groups within it, a broadscale phylogenetic analysis was conducted on these ferns plus representatives of putatively related families within the Eupolypods I clade. Two chloroplast loci, rbcL and atpB, were used in this study. A combined analysis of the two genes generated a well-resolved and strongly supported overall phylogeny of the Dryopteridaceae. The results indicate that the Dryopteridaceae form a monophyletic group with the exception of Didymochlaena, Hypodematium, and Leucostegia and are sister to a large clade comprising Lomariopsidaceae, Tectariaceae, Polypodiaceae, Davalliaceae, and Oleandraceae. Of the three previously unincorporated genera, Leptorumohra and Phanerophlebiopsis are nested within the genus Arachniodes, and Diacalpe is closely related to Acrophorus. The genus Pleocnemia, previously classified in Tectariaceae, clearly belongs in Dryopteridaceae and shows a close affinity to Lastreopsis. This study identifies four major lineages within the family, each strongly supported as a monophyletic group. Two large genera, Dryopteris and Polystichum, as traditionally defined, are shown to be polyphyletic and need to be revised in the future.

Tectariaceae are a pantropical fern family of about 20 genera, among which 8 are distributed in China. The morphological distinctiveness of the family is widely recognized, yet relatively little systematic research has been conducted on members of Tectariaceae. Phylogenetic analyses of chloroplast DNA sequence data (rbcL and atpB) from 15 species representing all 8 genera in China were carried out under parsimony criteria and Bayesian inference. The phylogenetic reconstructions indicated that the fern family Tectariaceae as traditionally circumscribed are polyphyletic. Ctenitis, Dryopsis, Lastreopsis clustered with and should be included within the newly-defined Dryopteridaceae, and Pleocnemia is also tentatively assigned to it. A narrowly monophyletic Tectariaceae is identified, which includes Ctenitopsis, Hemigramma, Pteridrys, Quercifilix, and Tectaria. In the single rbcL analysis, Arthropteris clustered with the above-mentioned monophyletic Tectariaceae. Although further investigations are still needed to identify infrafamilial relationships within the monophyletic Tectariaceae and to redefine several problematic genera, we propose a working concept here that better reflects the inferred evolutionary history of this group.