Molecular Phylogeny of Daucus (Apiaceae)

Abstract—

We studied the phylogeny of 22 accessions of Daucus and seven accessions in related genera, with DNA sequences from eight nuclear orthologs and one plastid (psbA/trnH) region. Maximum parsimony and maximum likelihood analyses of the concatenated data matrix of 7,212 aligned nucleotides provided excellent bootstrap support for many clades. Concordant with prior molecular results Pseudorlaya pumila was firmly imbedded within Daucus, as was Margottia gummifera, a new finding. All accessions of D. capillifolius, D. carota, and D. sahariensis formed a 2n = 18 clade with all other species within the Daucus clade with chromosome numbers of = 20, 22, and 44 (D. glochidiatus). Sister to the D. carota clade was a clade containing Margottia gummifera and Pseudorlaya pumila, sister to these species was D. crinitus, sister to all the above was D. muricatus, and sister to all of the above was a clade containing the remaining Daucus species. Bayesian analyses of individual regions analyzed separately and averaged over multiple trees with *BEAST software (a coalescent approach), however, provided a phylogeny at variance with the concatenated approach, most notably in firmly imbedding Turgenia latifolia within Daucus.