Molecular Phylogenetics Of Chinese Palmae Based On NrDNA ITS And CpDNA MatK Sequence Data

Phylogenetic relationships among the 18 original genera of the palm family were investigated using two DNA sequence data sets derived from matK, the maturase - coding gene located in an intron of the plastid gene trnK, and the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region of 18S-26S nuclear ribosomal DNA to examine relationships in 18 generas of chinese palm family. The main study results are summarized as follows:1) Determination of the three types of chinese primary palm plants ITS sequences, and comparison with other palm plants ITS sequences from the NCBI GenBank database. In the majority of cases, multiple clones from individuals resolved as monophyletic, which suggests that different copies of ITS not completely synchronized evolution, the same species of plant palm plants ITS sequences, sometimes far greater than differences between species of palm plants, However, the high levels of homoplasy in the ITS dataset, led to concerns that topologies obtained from these data might be unreliable;2) Determination of the original 11 categories of Chinese palm plants matK sequences, and comparison with other 8 Chinese palm matK sequence from the NCBI GenBank database. The results showed that palm plants matK sequence information of certain points, but more conservative;3) In all, 19 species representing 15 genera in palmae were examined. Our analyses provided the following insights: (1) Which substribe does Rhapis roebelenii and Chuniophoenix nana belong are inconsistent with previous classifications; (2) Phoeniceae and Corypheae have close relationships; (3)Except of Arenga and caryota,others have high bootstrap support,which is >60%; (4)Nypoideae and Calamineae is sister to the rest of the palms; (5) The result was basically consistent with that of previous classifications.