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Resistance, emigration, or adaptation? Phylogeography and ecology of European alpine plant species

Blattner, Frank R. [1].

Resistance, emigration, or adaptation? Phylogeography and ecology of European Alpine plant species.

High elevation mountain ranges provide an ecologically diverse set of plant habitats from montane forests to alpine pastures and rocky outcrops in otherwise glaciated areas. This habitat variety resulted in hot spots of biodiversity in nearly all mountainous regions of the earth, which was further amplified by Pleistocene climatic changes, promoting migrational exchanges of plants between mountain ranges and in situ adaptation. The plants of the European high mountain arc, spanning from southern Spain through the Pyrenees and Alps to the Carpathians in Romania, have many affinities to either Asia or the Mediterranean. These indicate colonization by immigration and, in the case of Mediterranean progenitors, possibly also adaptational changes during the major uplift of the European Alpine System during the last 10 million years. Recently, molecular analyses of phylogenetic relationships of several Alpine taxa together with phylogeographical approaches on the species level allowed insights in the divers histories of these taxa. It was possible to reconstruct colonization routes into the European Alpine System as well as migration among its mountain ranges. For several areas of the Alps glacial refugees could be identified that allowed in situ survival of plants during the Pleistocene. During this symposium new results together with overviews of the already obtained data will be presented. Principal topics will be the dating of colonization and speciation events to identify the influence of the Pleistocene glaciations on species diversity, and ecological shifts during or after immigration into the Alpine mountain ranges, eventually resulting in adaptive speciation.


1 - Inst. of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research, Dept. of Taxonomy, Corrensstr. 3, Gatersleben, D-06466, Germany

Keywords:
alpine biogeography
alpine habitats
phylogeography
speciation
adaptation.

Presentation Type: Symposium
Session: 48-1
Location: Ballroom 2 (Cliff Lodge)
Date: Wednesday, August 4th, 2004
Time: 9:45 AM
Abstract ID:401


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