The phylogeny of Seseli (Apiaceae, Apioideae): insights from molecular and morphological data

Abstract

Background The genus Seseli L., which consists of 125–140 species distributed in the Old World from western Europe and northwestern Africa to China and Japan, is one of the largest and most taxonomically difficult genera of Apiaceae Lindl. Although several previous studies have been conducted on Seseli based on limited morphological characteristics and molecular fragments, a robust and comprehensive phylogeny of Seseli remains elusive. Plastomes provide abundant genetic information and have been widely used in studying plant phylogeny and evolution. Consequently, we newly generated the complete plastomes of eleven Seseli taxa. We combined plastome data and morphological characteristics to investigate the phylogeny of Seseli. Results In our study, we observed that the genome length, gene numbers, IR/SC borders, and repeat composition of the eleven Seseli plastomes were variable. Several appropriate mutation hotspot regions may be developed as candidate DNA barcodes for evolution, phylogeny, and species identification of Seseli. The phylogenetic results identified that Seseli was not a monophyletic group. Moreover, the eleven newly sequenced Seseli taxa did not cluster with S. tortuosum (the type species of Seseli, belonging to the tribe Selineae), where S. delavayi clustered with Eriocycla belonging to the tribe Echinophoreae and the other ten belonged to Selineae. The comparative plastome and morphological characteristics analyses confirmed the reliability of the phylogenetic analyses and implied the complex evolution of Seseli. Conclusion Combining molecular and morphological data is efficient and useful for studying the phylogeny of Seseli. We suggest that “a narrow sense” of Seseli will be meaningful for further study and the current taxonomic system of Seseli needs to be revised. In summary, our study can provide new insights into the phylogenetic relationships and taxonomic framework of Seseli.

The complete plastomes of thirteen Libanotis (Apiaceae, Apioideae) plants: comparative and phylogenetic analyses provide insights into the plastome evolution and taxonomy of Libanotis

“…We employed the online REPuter program [ 72 ] to identify repeat sequences in the plastomes of the thirteen Libanotis taxa and the parameters used for this analysis referred to Cai et al [ 33 ]. Furthermore, we utilized the Perl script MISA [ 73 ], available at http://pgrc.ipk-gatersleben.de/misa/sleben.de/misa/ , to detect simple sequence repeats (SSRs) within the plastomes of the thirteen Libanotis taxa.…”

“…This analysis aimed to pinpoint regions with elevated mutation rates, potentially serving as valuable molecular markers for future research. Regions meeting or exceeding a length of 200 base pairs were singled out for this purpose, as described previously [ 33 ].…”

“…Recently, Seseli s.s. was established and several phylogenetic studies using molecular fragments (nrITS and nrETS) robustly supported that L. sibirica C. A. Mey. (type species of Libanotis , L. montana Crantz ≡ Seseli libanotis W.D.J.Koch = L. sibirica ) did not cluster with Seseli tortuosum L. (type species of Seseli ) into a monophyletic branch [ 32 , 33 ]. Hence, we believe that the taxonomic status of Libanotis needs to be discussed again, especially in China.…”

Seseli kurdistanicum (Apiaceae), a new species from Van Province, eastern Turkey

“…Coriandrum sativum was used as an outgroup based on the results of the earlier higher‐level phylogenetic study of the subfamily Apioideae (Valiejo‐Roman et al 2006). In spite of that the genus Seseli is clearly non‐monophyletic (Banasiak et al 2013, Cai et al 2022), and even Seseli sect. Seseli is non‐monophyletic at the present stage of study (Lyskov et al 2018), we did not expand the sampling of the latest molecular research (Lyskov et al 2018) because the main aim of our molecular study was to demonstrate the close relationship of our new species to taxa of Seseli sect.…”

Phylogeny and Taxonomic Revision of the Genus Melanosciadium (Apiaceae), Based on Plastid Genomes and Morphological Evidence

“…These markers include nuclear ribosomal DNA (nrDNA), internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequences, and plastid loci and have even revealed that some genera (e.g., Angelica L., Ligusticum L., Peucedanum L., and Seseli L.) are not monophyletic [ 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 ]. More recently, high-throughput DNA sequencing techniques have been employed in Apioideae research, such as the sequencing of the carrot genome [ 16 ], transcriptomes [ 17 ], whole chloroplasts [ 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 ], and the analysis of the Angiosperms353 gene [ 24 ]. However, it is worth noting that most of these studies are broad-scale investigations rather than focused studies on specific taxa.…”