Animal‐mediated long‐distance dispersals and migrations shaping the intercontinental disjunctions of Celastrus (Celastraceae) among five continents

Abstract

The mechanisms underlying the origin, evolution, and distributional patterns of organisms are a major focus of biogeography. Vicariance and long-distance dispersal (LDD) are two important explanations for disjunctive distribution patterns among lineages. In-depth biogeographic studies of taxa that exhibit wide-ranging disjunctions can provide valuable information for addressing the relative importance of these biogeographic mechanisms. The genus Celastrus contains ca. 30 species that are disjunctly distributed in five continents of both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, providing an excellent system for historical biogeographic analyses. Here, we used sequence data from five markers (nuclear external transcribed spacer and internal transcribed spacer, and plastid psbA-trnH, rpl16, and trnL-F) to reconstruct the phylogeny of Celastrus and investigate its phylogenetic relationships with Tripterygium, estimate clade divergence times using the fossil-calibrated method, and infer its ancestral distribution range. Celastrus and Tripterygium were each supported as monophyletic. The morphology-based classification systems were not supported by the phylogenetic results. The divergence time between Celastrus and Tripterygium was estimated to be 26.22 Ma (95% highest posterior density: 24.46-28.17 Ma), and the diversification of Celastrus were suggested to be linked to global warming events during the Miocene. Celastrus was suggested to have a tropical Asian origin, and dispersed to Central and South America, North America, Oceania, and Madagascar at different periods, most probably through LDD. Birds may have facilitated transoceanic migrations of Celastrus because of its bicolored fruits, which contain red and fleshy arils. Our results highlight the importance of key morphological innovations and animal-mediated dispersals for the rapid diversification of plant lineages across vast distributional ranges.

Novel classification and biogeography of Leptolejeunea (Lejeuneaceae, Marchantiophyta) with implications for the origin and evolution of the Asian evergreen broad‐leaved forests

“…Several other vascular lineages were also inferred to have migrated between Sahul (e.g., Australia) and Sundaland (e.g., SE Asia), including Livistona R.Br. (Arecaceae) (Crayn et al, 2015), Isoёtes L. (Isoёtaceae) (Choi et al, 2018), and Celastrus L. (Celastraceae) (Zhu et al, 2020), and some migrated in the opposite direction (e.g., Cinnamomum group (Lauraceae) (Huang et al, 2016) and Cryptocarya R.Br (Lauraceae) (van der Merwe et al, 2016)). The latter direction also presented in L. epiphylla and L. schiffneri by recent dispersal.…”

Molecular Phylogeny, Character Evolution, and Biogeography of Hydrangea Section Cornidia, Hydrangeaceae

“…Our ancestral area reconstruction results and the fact that Hydrangea species have dust-like diaspores that could be dispersed by wind, water, or on animal bodies (Armesto and Rozzi, 1989 ; Hufford, 1995 ) suggest that the ancestor of the section arrived in the New World by long-distance dispersal from Asia. In contrast to the well-known North American—East Asian disjunction (e.g., Graham, 1972 ; Axelrod, 1975 ; Cracraft, 1975 ; Donoghue et al, 2001 ; Wen et al, 2010 ; González et al, 2014 ; Feng et al, 2020 ), the unusual Asian/Central- and Mesoamerican—South American disjunction, which is not including eastern North America, is less well-known in plants and has only been investigated recently (Wang et al, 2020 ; Zhu et al, 2020 ; Yao et al, 2021 ). These authors, respectively, in Lardizabalaceae, Celastrus (Celastraceae), and Ilex (Aquifoliaceae), hypothesize an eastern Asian origin of the taxon studied, followed by one or more long-distance dispersal events to Central and South America (and in the case of Celastrus also to other continents), showing this pattern to be more common than previously assumed, thus strengthening our own hypothesis.…”

Reassessment of the Phylogeny and Systematics of Chinese Parnassia (Celastraceae): A Thorough Investigation Using Whole Plastomes and Nuclear Ribosomal DNA

“…We used four different times constraints based on the fossil records: (1) exponential priors (offset = 50.5, mean = 0.5) were set for the stem node of the monotypic Catha (following Poole and Wilkinson, 1999); (2) normal prior (mean = 26, St. dev. = 1) was set for the crown age of Celastrus + Tripterygium clade (following Xi et al, 2012;Bacon et al, 2016;Zhu et al, 2020); (3) exponential priors (offset = 56.5, mean = 0.833) were set for the stem node of Glyptopetalum + Euonymus (following Pitman and Rowan, 2012); and (4) secondary age was estimated from Xi et al (2012) and Bacon et al (2016), and a normal prior (mean = 90.6, St. dev. = 8.1) was set for the crown clade of Celastrales.…”