RUI: Molecular and Morphological Data in the Gesneriaceae

9317775史密斯苦苣苔科（Gesneriaceae）是非洲紫罗兰科植物，主要分布在新大陆和旧大陆的热带地区，除了那些被认为是珍贵的物种外，在生物学上鲜为人知。博伊西州立大学的詹姆斯·史密斯博士率先将新的基于DNA的分析方法应用于该科的分类划界和系统发育重建问题。在本科生的帮助下，他正在利用传统的形态特征和叶绿体DNA的新证据，探索所有部落和大多数属的代表性物种的系统发育关系。这些独立数据集的一致性将为详细研究植物地理学和传粉系统的演变奠定基础。不同来源数据的比较和整合是当代系统发育研究的重要竞技场。在这场辩论中，很少将热带地区的分类群作为模式系统进行探讨，因为一般来说，它们知之甚少。詹姆斯·史密斯博士的RUI项目将为苦苣苔科的研究和一般的分类方法学提供新的DNA数据和精细的形态学见解。

9317775 Smith The Gesneriaceae, the African-violet family of plants, is a mostly tropical group in the New and Old Worlds, little known biologically except for those species prized as ornamentals. Dr. James Smith of Boise State University has pioneered the application of new DNA-based methods of analysis to problems of taxonomic delimitation and phylogenetic reconstruction in this family. With assistance from undergraduate students in research, he is exploring phylogenetic relationships in representative species of all tribes and most genera of the family, using traditional morphological characters and new evidence from chloroplast DNA. Concordance in these independent datasets will lay the basis for detailed studies of biogeography and of the evolution of pollination systems. The comparison and integration of data from different sources constitute an important arena of contemporary phylogenetic research. Taxa from predominantly tropical regions are rarely explored as model systems in this debate, because in general they are poorly known. The RUI project by Dr. James Smith will contribute new DNA data and refined morphological insights to the study of Gesneriaceae in particular and to taxonomic methodology in general.