Abstract Detail

Biogeography

Sanbonmatsu, Katie [1], Spalink, Daniel [2].

Spatial Phylogenetics of Mosses (Bryopsida) at a Global Scale: Environmental Correlates of Diversity.

Massive digitization of herbarium specimens and DNA sequencing efforts in the past decade have enabled integrative analyses of patterns of diversity in a phylogenetic context. While such studies exist for many plant species, they remain limited for bryophytes. Here, we develop a phylogeny of 3,654 mosses and compile a biogeographic database of nearly 1.3 million individual records to investigate global patterns of biodiversity across the moss phylogeny. Phylogenetic diversity peaks in the Scandinavian Peninsula, the Andes, New Zealand and Tasmania, and the temperate coniferous rainforests of North America. Of these, only New Zealand and Tasmania show higher than expected phylogenetic diversity according to randomizations. We report that mean phylogenetic distance was significantly higher than expected in areas with high species richness, indicating that reported richness in these areas is likely a product of repeated colonization from suitable climatic areas following disturbance. Patterns of endemism reported here are generally consistent with other findings, except we found high endemism in central Chile, southeastern Brazil, Veracruz and Oaxaca (Mexico), Japan and Southeast Asia, as well as Tasmania and the southeastern tip of New South Wales and Victoria in Australia. Statistical analyses reveal that precipitation is strongly correlated to species richness and phylogenetic diversity, while mean vapor pressure appears to be most closely linked to per-species endemism. Finally, analysis of taxonomic and phylogenetic regionalizations indicate that, while taxonomic regionalizations are generally consistent with those for Angiosperms, phylogenetic regionalizations for mosses tend to cluster into a Holarctic/Holantarctic temperate region, a pantropical region, and a region composed of South/Central Australia. These results provide evidence for the theory that long-distance dispersal of spores obscures signals of vicariance, and that ecological filtering plays a major role in shaping moss distributions.

1 - TAMU, Dept. Of Ecology And Conservation Biology, S.M. Tracy Herbarium 2138 TAMU, College Station, TX, 77843, United States
2 - Texas A&M University, Ecosystem Science And Management, 2138 TAMU, College Station, TX, 77802, United States

Keywords:
biogeography
Bryophytes
diversity
endemism
moss
global
species richness.

Presentation Type: Oral Paper
Session: BIOGI, Biogeography I
Location: Virtual/Virtual
Date: Monday, July 19th, 2021
Time: 2:00 PM(EDT)
Number: BIOGI007
Abstract ID:438
Candidate for Awards:None