Closing a Gap in Macroevolutionary Studies: Integrating Fossils and Phenotypes to Illuminate Morphological Evolution in Monocot Flowering Plants

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This project will study monocot flowering plants, a highly diverse group of plants that are economically and ecologically important, including many staple foods (grains, plantains, oil palms), horticulturally valuable plants (lilies, orchids, irises), and the main components of ecosystems such as grasslands and wetlands. The leaves and fruits/seeds from both living and fossil monocots will be studied to understand how morphology has changed over the evolutionary history of this important group. Broadening our understanding of evolutionary patterns and processes across all life is relevant to addressing present-day challenges such as how species and Earth systems will adapt to current and future environmental change. The project will provide training for high school, undergraduate, and graduate students, including those who are from groups that are currently underrepresented in STEM fields. In addition, a new website to increase recognition of Earth & environmental scientists who are from a diversity of backgrounds and experiences will be created and a public display at the University of Michigan Natural History Museum will help communicate findings from this research to the public.A subset of monocot flowering plants will be used as a model system for understanding macroevolutionary processes relating to phenotypic diversity. Morphological data on leaf and fruit/seed traits from four orders-Alismatales (water-plantains and seagrasses), Pandanales (screw-pines), Arecales (palms) and Zingiberales (bananas & gingers)-will be collected to build a novel phenotypic framework facilitating the interpretation and phylogenetic placement of fossil taxa. A new time-calibrated phylogenetic tree will be produced using a revised fossil record. Properties of plant traits, including correlations among traits and differences between vegetative (leaf) and reproductive (fruit/seed) traits on phylogenetic inference will be characterized. Finally, the phenotypic data will be analyzed to infer temporal shifts in morphospace, quantify disparity, and determine rates and modes of morphological evolution in these four clades of monocots.This award is co-funded with the Systematics and Biodiversity Sciences program (Division of Environmental Biology).This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.