The regional species richness and genetic diversity of Arctic vegetation reflect both past glaciations and current climate

AIM : The Arctic has experienced marked climatic differences between glacial and interglacial periods and is now subject to a rapidly warming climate. Knowledge of the effects of historical processes on current patterns of diversity may aid predictions of the responses of vegetation to future climate change. We aim to test whether plant species and genetic diversity patterns are correlated with time since deglaciation at regional and local scales. We also investigate whether species richness is correlated with genetic diversity in vascular plants. LOCATION : Circumarctic. METHODS : We investigated species richness of the vascular plant flora of 21 floristic provinces and examined local species richness in 6215 vegetation plots distributed across the Arctic. We assessed levels of genetic diversity inferred from amplified fragment length polymorphism variation across populations of 23 common Arctic species. Correlations between diversity measures and landscape age (time since deglaciation) as well as variables characterizing current climate were analysed using spatially explicit simultaneous autoregressive models. RESULTS : lts Regional species richness of vascular plants and genetic diversity were correlated with each other, and both showed a positive relationship with landscape age. Plot species richness showed differing responses for vascular plants, bryophytes and lichens. At this finer scale, the richness of vascular plants was not significantly related to landscape age, which had a small effect size compared to the models of bryophyte and lichen richness. MAIN CONCLUSION : Our study suggests that imprints of past glaciations in Arctic vegetation diversity patterns at the regional scale are still detectable today. Since Arctic vegetation is still limited by post-glacial migration lag, it will most probably also exhibit lags in response to current and future climate change. Our results also suggest that local species richness at the plot scale is more determined by local habitat factors.Compilation of the species richness data was made possible through the TFI Networks grant to CD, “Effect Studies and Adaptation to Climate Change,” under the Norforsk initiative (2011 – 2014) which supported two CBIONET-AVA workshops held in Denmark during 2013. The genetic studies were funded by the Research Council of Norway (grant nos. 150322/720 and 170952/V40 to CB).http://http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1466-82382017-04-30hb2016Plant Production and Soil Scienc

Genetic introgression as a potential to widen a species' niche: Insights from alpine Carex curvula

Times Cited: 12International audienceUnderstanding what causes the decreasing abundance of species at the margins of their distributions along environmental gradients has drawn considerable interest, especially because of the recent need to predict shifts in species distribution patterns in response to climatic changes. Here, we address the ecological range limit problem by focusing on the sedge, Carex curvula, a dominant plant of high-elevation grasslands in Europe, for which two ecologically differentiated but crosscompatible taxa have been described in the Alps. Our study heuristically combines an extensive phytoecological survey of alpine plant communities to set the niche attributes of each taxon and a population genetic study to assess the multilocus genotypes of 177 individuals sampled in typical and marginal habitats. We found that ecological variation strongly correlates with genetic differentiation. Our data strongly suggest that ecologically marginal populations of each taxon are mainly composed of individuals with genotypes resulting from introgressive hybridization. Conversely, no hybrids were found in typical habitats, even though the two taxa were close enough to crossbreed. Thus, our results indicate that genotype integrity is maintained in optimal habitats, whereas introgressed individuals are favored in marginal habitats. We conclude that gene flow between closely related taxa might be an important, although underestimated, mechanism shaping species distribution along gradients

Epiphytic lichen and moss vegetation along an altitude gradient on Mount Aenos (Kefallinia, Greece).

NatuurwetenskappeBotaniePlease help us populate SUNScholar with the post print version of this article. It can be e-mailed to: [email protected]

Post-glacial history of the dominant alpine sedge Carex curvula in the European Alpine System inferred from nuclear and chloroplast markers

International audienceThe alpine sedge Carex curvula ssp. curvula is a clonal, dominant graminoid found in the European Alps, the Carpathians, the Pyrenees and in some of the Balkan Mountains. It is a late-successional species of acidophilous alpine meadows that occurs on sites that were covered by ice during the last glacial maximum (LGM). By applying the amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) fingerprinting and chloroplast DNA (cpDNA) sequencing, we attempted to identify the recolonization routes followed by the species after the last ice retreat. We relied on the genetic diversity of 37 populations covering the entire distributional range of the species. As a wind-pollinated species, C. curvula is characterized by a low level of population genetic differentiation. Nuclear and chloroplast data both support the hypothesis of a long-term separation of Eastern (Balkans and Carpathians) and Western (Alps and Pyrenees) lineages. In the Alps, a continuum of genetic depauperation from the east to the west may be related to a recolonization wave originating in the eastern-most parts of the chain, where the main glacial refugium was likely located. The Pyrenean populations are nested within the western Alps group and show a low level of genetic diversity, probably due to recent long-distance colonization. In contrast to the Alps, we found no phylogeographical structure in the Carpathians. The combination of reduced ice extension during the Würm period and the presence of large areas of siliceous substrate at suitable elevation suggest that in contrast to populations in the Alps, the species in the Carpathians underwent a local vertical migration rather than extinction and recolonization over long distance