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Evidence for a conserved karyotype in Swartzia (Fabaceae, Papilionoideae): Implications for the taxonomy and evolutionary diversification of a species-rich neotropical tree genus

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Abstract

To assess the taxonomic utility of cytogenetic variation in the species-rich neotropical papilionoid legume genus Swartzia and to ascertain the importance of cytogenetic evolution in the diversification history of the genus, a variety of cytogenetic data—chromosome number, chromosome lengths, relative chromosome length, total chromatin length (TCL), CMA/DAPI and FISH—were collected for 19 taxa of Swartzia and for a single species of the related genus Ateleia. In the sampled species of Swartzia, chromosome counts yielded a diploid number of 2n=2x=26. However, both diploid and tetraploid (2n=4x=52) counts were obtained for S. leptopetala. The species of Swartzia presented small chromosomes (0.25μm to 1.41μm), with gradual length variation, furthermore, each of them had two sites of CMA+/DAPI- and two sites of 45S and 5S rDNA. Cytogenetic data for the morphologically anomalous species S. euxylophora convey its close relationship to other species of Swartzia. Ateleia ovata was found to differ from all of the sampled taxa of Swartzia in diploid chromosome number (2n =28). Taken together, these results constitute preliminary evidence for a strongly conserved karyotype pattern in Swartzia and in combination with previously published data suggest that karyological characters, while useful for characterizing the genus, are of limited taxonomic utility within Swartzia. We conclude that cytogenetic evolution involving changes in chromosome number has not figured prominently in the explosive diversification history of Swartzia.

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Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Post-Graduate Program of the Universidade Estadual de Campinas (PPG-UNICAMP), the Fundação de Apoio ao Ensino, Pesquisa e Extensão (FAEPEX-UNICAMP), and fellowships sponsored by grants to ERFM and VFM (process numbers 306142/2011-2 and 309987/2012-1, respectively) from the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq). RBP is grateful to the Programa de Capacitação em Taxonomia (PROTAX), for providing his Master’s scholarship (process number 562280/2010-3). Herbarium and field studies were also supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF DEB-0918498, PIs BMT and VFM) and from the National Geographic Society Committee for Research and Exploration (NGS CRE grant no. 8770-­10, PI BMT). We thank Dr. Itayguara Costa (Universidade Federal do Ceará - UFC), Msc. Jorge Tamashiro (UNICAMP), Dr. Adriana Lobão (Universidade Federal Fluminense - UFF), and several other colleagues for providing seeds for this work, Dr. Alberto Vicentini (Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia - INPA) for assistance during fieldtrips near Manaus, and Dr. Ana Maria Goulart de Azevedo Tozzi (UNICAMP) for sharing her knowledge on Fabaceae and Swartzia.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Biologia Vegetal, Instituto de Biologia, CP 6109, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, 13083-970, Campinas, SP, Brazil

    Rafael Barbosa Pinto

  2. Instituto de Pesquisas do Jardim Botânico do Rio de Janeiro, DIPEQ, Rua Pacheco Leão 915/sala 208, 22460-030, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil

    Vidal de Freitas Mansano

  3. Institute of Systematic Botany, The New York Botanical Garden, 2900 Sothern Blvd., 10458-5126, Bronx, NY, USA

    Benjamin M. Torke

  4. Departamento de Biologia Vegetal, Instituto de Biologia, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, CP 6109, Campinas, SP, 13083-970, Brazil

    Eliana Regina Forni-Martins

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  1. Rafael Barbosa Pinto
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  2. Vidal de Freitas Mansano
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  4. Eliana Regina Forni-Martins
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Correspondence to Rafael Barbosa Pinto.

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Pinto, R.B., de Freitas Mansano, V., Torke, B.M. et al. Evidence for a conserved karyotype in Swartzia (Fabaceae, Papilionoideae): Implications for the taxonomy and evolutionary diversification of a species-rich neotropical tree genus. Brittonia 68, 93–101 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12228-015-9395-z

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