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Cryptic diversity within the African aquatic plant Ottelia ulvifolia (Hydrocharitaceae) revealed by population genetic and phylogenetic analyses

  • Regular Paper – Taxonomy/Phylogenetics/Evolutionary Biology
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Abstract

Revealing cryptic diversity is of great importance for effective conservation and understanding macroevolution and ecology of plants. Ottelia, a typical example of aquatic plants, possesses extremely variable morphology and the presence of cryptic diversity makes its classification problematic. Previous studies have revealed cryptic Ottelia species in Asia, but very little is known about the molecular systematics of this genus in Africa, a center of species diversity of Ottelia. In this study, we sampled Ottelia ulvifolia, an endemic species of tropical Africa, from Zambia and Cameroon. We used six chloroplast DNA regions, nrITS and six polymorphic microsatellite markers to estimate the molecular diversity and population genetic structure in O. ulvifolia. The phylogenetic inference, STACEY and STRUCTURE analyses supported at least three clusters within O. ulvifolia, each representing unique flower types (i.e., bisexual yellow flower, unisexual yellow flower and bisexual white flower types). Although abundant genetic variation (> 50%) was observed within the populations, excessive anthropogenic activities may result in genetic drift and bottlenecks. Here, three cryptic species of O. ulvifolia complex are defined, and insights are provided into the taxonomy of Ottelia using the phylogenetic species concept.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Tacham Walter Ndam and Eric Ngasop for their immense assistance and valuable information for our fieldwork in Cameroon; the Department of National Parks and Wildlife-Zambia for support and involvement in fieldwork in Zambia. This Research was conducted under Permit No. 0000072 /MINRESI /B00 /C00/C10/C12 in Cameroon and Permit No. DNPW/8/27/1 from the department of National Parks and Wildlife, Zambia. This study was supported by grants from the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. XDB31000000) and the Sino Africa Joint Research Center (Nos. Y323771W07 and SAJC201322).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CAS Key Laboratory of Aquatic Botany and Watershed Ecology, Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, 430074, China

    Zhi-Zhong Li, Boniface K. Ngarega, Andrew W. Gichira, Mwihaki J. Karichu & Jin-Ming Chen

  2. Center of Conservation Biology, Core Botanical Gardens, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, 430074, China

    Zhi-Zhong Li, Qing-Feng Wang & Jin-Ming Chen

  3. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Zhi-Zhong Li, Boniface K. Ngarega, Andrew W. Gichira & Mwihaki J. Karichu

  4. Sino-Africa Joint Research Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, 430074, China

    Boniface K. Ngarega, Andrew W. Gichira, Mwihaki J. Karichu & Qing-Feng Wang

  5. Herbarium, Biodiversity Unit, University of Turku, 20014, Turku, Finland

    Samuli Lehtonen

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  1. Zhi-Zhong Li
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  2. Boniface K. Ngarega
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Li, ZZ., Ngarega, B.K., Lehtonen, S. et al. Cryptic diversity within the African aquatic plant Ottelia ulvifolia (Hydrocharitaceae) revealed by population genetic and phylogenetic analyses. J Plant Res 133, 373–381 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10265-020-01175-2

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