Is geographical closeness more important than morphological traits ?
Niels Jacobsen*, Conny Asmussen Lange, Jan Bastmeijer, Takashige Idei, Duangchai Sookchaloem, Fiorello Toneatto, and Marian Ørgaard.
*dept. Agriculture and Ecology, Copenhagen University
The MatK – and hopefully soon the ITS studies in Cryptocoryne will provide us with a general frame of relationships in the genus.
The aim of the AFLP studies in Cryptocoryne was to elucidate the genetic distances within species and species complexes: Some species of Cryptocoryne seem to be distinguished and understood rather easily (some of this “understood rather easily” may be due to insufficient material = too few samples). Other species have for a long time been more problematic i.e. morphologically variable.
The talk focuses on the C. beckettii complex (2n = 28, 42) from Sri Lanka, the C. cordata complex (2n = 34, 68, 102) from Malesia, and the C. crispatula complex (2n = 36, 54, 72) from Mainland Asia. The obtained results clearly point towards geographical closeness as an indicator of genetical closeness rather than morphological similarities. In the C. crispatula complex geographically distant and therefore genetically distant populations respond similarly to similar edaphic conditions, i.e. develop similar leaf-forms under similar edaphic conditions.
