The tropics hold at least an order of magnitude greater plant diversity than the temperate zone, yet the reasons for this difference are still subject to debate. Much of tropical plant diversity is in highly speciose genera and understanding the drivers of such high species richness will help solve the tropical diversity enigma. Hybridization has recently been shown to underlie many adaptive radiations, but its role in the evolution of speciose tropical plant genera has received little attention. Here, we address this topic in the hyperdiverse Bromeliaceae genus Vriesea using genome skimming data covering the three genomic compartments. We find evidence for hybridization in ca. 11% of the species in our dataset,both within the genus and between Vriesea and other genera, which is commensurate with hybridization underlying the hyperdiversity of Vriesea, and potentially other genera in Tillandsioideae. While additional genomic research will be needed to further clarify the contribution of hybridization to the rapid diversification of Vriesea, our study provides an important first data point suggesting its importance to the evolution of tropical plant diversity.

中文翻译：

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基因组撇除显示在​​新热带开花植物辐射中广泛杂交。

热带地区比温带地区拥有至少至少一个数量级的植物多样性，但是造成这种差异的原因尚有争议。许多热带植物的多样性都属于特殊物种，了解如此丰富的物种的动因将有助于解决热带多样性之谜。杂交最近被证明是许多适应性辐射的基础，但是它在特定热带植物属的进化中的作用却很少受到关注。在这里，我们使用覆盖三个基因组区室的基因组撇除数据，在凤梨科的超多样性凤梨科中解决了这个话题。我们发现在ca中杂交的证据。在我们的数据集中，属Vriesea和其他属之间的物种中，有11％这与潜在的金龟子属，以及铁兰科的其他属潜在的杂交相对应。虽然需要进一步的基因组研究来进一步阐明杂交对Vriesea快速多样化的贡献，但我们的研究提供了重要的第一个数据点，表明其对热带植物多样性的进化至关重要。