Recent, Late Pleistocene fragmentation shaped the phylogeographic structure of the European black pine (Pinus nigra Arnold)

Portuguese Pinus nigra J.F. Arnold populations: genetic diversity, structure and relationships inferred by SSR markers

“…Giovannelli et al (2019) recently reported the need for revising the infraspecific taxonomy of this pine species based on the integration of molecular data with its demographic history resulting from geological events. Regarding the wide and patchy distribution of P. nigra, it was expected a strong genetic differentiation among populations and a low within-population genetic diversity (Giovannelli et al 2019;Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019). However, these authors reported a weak genetic spatial structure probably resulting from the fragmentation of an ancestral population at the late Pleistocene or early Holocene into six to seven genetic lineages with high gene flow among them, actively contributing for admixture (Giovannelli et al 2019;Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019).…”

“…The populations of P. nigra studied by various authors presented high variation at different levels (Scaltsoyiannes et al 1994;Rafii et al 1996;Quézel and Médail 2003;Bogunić et al 2003Bogunić et al , 2007Bogunić et al , 2009 Afzal- Rafii and Dodd 2007;del Cerro et al 2009;Rubio-Moraga et al 2012;Bonavita et al 2016). Due to their geographically fragmented distribution areas, a reduced intrapopulation genetic diversity for these P. nigra populations is expected (Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019). Nonetheless, recent molecular studies revealed a weak genetic spatial structure originated from events that occurred in the late Pleistocene or early Holocene (Giovannelli et al 2019;Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019).…”

“…Due to their geographically fragmented distribution areas, a reduced intrapopulation genetic diversity for these P. nigra populations is expected (Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019). Nonetheless, recent molecular studies revealed a weak genetic spatial structure originated from events that occurred in the late Pleistocene or early Holocene (Giovannelli et al 2019;Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019). These events fragmented one ancestral P. nigra population into six to seven distinct genetic lineages with high gene flow among them (Giovannelli et al 2019;Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019).…”

“…Nonetheless, recent molecular studies revealed a weak genetic spatial structure originated from events that occurred in the late Pleistocene or early Holocene (Giovannelli et al 2019;Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019). These events fragmented one ancestral P. nigra population into six to seven distinct genetic lineages with high gene flow among them (Giovannelli et al 2019;Scotti-Saintagne et al 2019). The same authors proposed the revision of the infraspecific taxonomy of P. nigra species on five subspecies with Mediterranean distribution based on the length and stiffness of needles: (i) salzmannii (Dunal) Franco; (ii) nigra Arnold; (iii) dalmatica (Visiani) Franco; (iv) pallasiana (Lambert) Holmboe and (v) laricio (Poiret) Maire (Gaussen et al 1993), and a sixth subspecies, P. nigra subsp.…”

“…mauretanica (Maire and Peyerimh) Heywood assigned to the North of Africa (Bussotti 2002). Scotti-Saintagne et al (2019) proposed to name the recently discovered six lineages of P. nigra using regionally accepted subspecies-level names. Additionally to the six main inter-fertile P. nigra subspecies agreed so far (Quézel and Médail 2003), some of those are also divided into two to four regional varieties (Christensen 1997; Barbéro et al 1998;Price et al 1998;Bussotti 2002).…”