U. S. - Brazil International Systematics and Evolution of the Plant Genus Escallonia (Escalloniaceae): Integrating Morphology and Molecules in the Neotropical Mountains

该奖项将支持博士生Felipe Zapata与他的导师Peter Stevens合作的博士论文改进项目。本项目的研究目标是利用植物标本馆标本的多变量形态学分析，结合叶绿体和核标记序列的系统发育分析，对刺花属植物进行物种鉴定和划分，并重建其进化历史。形态学和分子模式将与时间（如节点测年）、生态（如野外数据）和地理（如地理障碍）变量相结合，以阐明该属的历史生物地理学，并提出其多样化的潜在机制。在巴西的研究将与巴西Saõ Paulo的Saõ Paulo大学植物系的Lucia G. Lohmann博士合作进行。

Stevens0738118This award will support a Doctoral Dissertation Enhancement Project for Doctoral Student Felipe Zapata working with his advisor Peter Stevens. The research objectives of project are to identify and delimit the species in the plant genus Escallonia, and to reconstruct their evolutionary history using multivariate analyses of morphological measurements taken from herbarium specimens, combined with phylogenetic analyses of sequences from chloroplast and nuclear markers. Morphological and molecular patterns will be integrated with temporal (e.g., node dating), ecological (e.g., field data), and geographic (e.g., geographic barriers) variables to shed light on the historical biogeography of the genus and to suggest potential mechanisms for its diversification. Research in Brazil will be studied in collaboration with Dr. Lucia G. Lohmann from the department of Botany at the University of Saõ Paulo, in Saõ Paulo, Brazil.