Evolution of Tropical Heliconia: Temporal and Spatial Diversification at the Species Level

在切尔西·斯佩克特博士的指导下，加州大学伯克利分校获得了一个奖项，以研究花型的多样性和被称为向日葵的热带植物科的分类。这项拟议的研究的目的是了解向日葵科的进化史，这是一个具有重要生态和经济意义的热带植物科。向日葵科(向日葵属)包括约215种(目前已知的190种，估计仍有25种有待描述)，主要分布在新热带地区。虽然向日葵在世界各地作为热带观赏植物种植，但原生范围从墨西哥中部延伸到南美洲中部，包括加勒比海地区，有一组六个密切相关的物种，原产于印度尼西亚、新几内亚和几个南太平洋岛屿。虽然向日葵经常被作为观赏植物种植，但关于向日葵属物种之间的关系还没有得到很好支持的假说，主要是因为蜂鸟授粉所特有的花特征相似。根据形态，物种在分类上被划分为亚属，但这种分类还没有得到检验。每个螺旋属物种都与授粉的蜂鸟和食草性卷叶硬毛甲虫以及其他互惠、寄生和捕食的伙伴关系保持着复杂和专门的进化关系。一个全面的、得到充分支持的系统发育是必要的，以确定该科内的种级关系，并了解在这种复杂的种间相互作用中涉及的花卉和营养特征的进化。这一系统发育将被用来(A)利用进化关系来协调和修订该科的分类，以确定亚属类群的特殊特征，以及(B)解释传粉关系、草食动物相互作用和热带生物地理的进化趋势。培训将在研究生和本科阶段进行，将学生纳入研究的所有方面，包括实地采集、系统发育和生物地理分析，以及新物种和更高级别的分类分类的描述。

An award has been made to the University of California at Berkeley under the direction of Dr. Chelsea Specht to study the diversification of floral form and the classification of a family of tropical plants known as heliconias. The goal of the proposed research is to develop an understanding of the evolutionary history of Heliconiaceae, an ecologically and economically important family of tropical plants. The family Heliconiaceae (heliconias) comprises approximately 215 species (190 currently recognized with an estimated 25 remaining to be described) in the single genus Heliconia, distributed primarily in the neotropics. While heliconias are grown as tropical ornamentals throughout the world, the native range extends from central Mexico to central South America including the Caribbean, with a group of six closely related species native to Indonesia, New Guinea, and several South Pacific islands. Although heliconias are frequently cultivated as ornamentals, there have been no well-supported hypotheses on relationships among species of Heliconia, primarily due to similarities in flower traits that are specific to hummingbird pollination. Species have been divided taxonomically into subgenera based on morphology, but this classification has not been tested. Heliconia species each maintain intricate and specialized evolutionary relationships with pollinating hummingbirds and herbivorous rolled-leaf hispine beetles, as well as other mutualistic, parasitic, and predatory partnerships. A comprehensive, well-supported phylogeny is necessary to determine species-level relationships within the family and to understand the evolution of floral and vegetative characters involved in such complex interspecies interactions. This phylogeny will be used to (a) reconcile and revise the taxonomy of the family using evolutionary relationships to determine specialized features of subgeneric groupings and (b) interpret evolutionary trends in pollination relationships, herbivore interactions, and tropical biogeography. Training will take place at both graduate and undergraduate levels, incorporating students into all aspects of the research, including field collections, phylogenetic and biogeographic analyses, and the description of new species and higher-level taxonomic groupings.