Journal
MOLECULAR PHYLOGENETICS AND EVOLUTION
Volume 61, Issue 1, Pages 237-243Publisher
ACADEMIC PRESS INC ELSEVIER SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1016/j.ympev.2011.05.016
Keywords
Ants; Lycaenid butterflies; Parasitic caterpillars; Phylogeny; Maximum likelihood; Bayesian inference
Funding
- Danish National Science Research Foundation
- Tonder Statsskoles Elevforening
- National Science Foundation [DEB-0447242]
- Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovacion [CGL2010-21226/BOS]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Despite much research on the socially parasitic large blue butterflies (genus Maculinea) in the past 40 years, their relationship to their closest relatives, Phengaris, is controversial and the relationships among the remaining genera in the Glaucopsyche section are largely unresolved. The evolutionary history of this butterfly section is particularly important to understand the evolution of life history diversity connected to food-plant and host-ant associations in the larval stage. In the present study, we use a combination of four nuclear and two mitochondrial genes to reconstruct the phylogeny of the Glaucopsyche section, and in particular, to study the relationships among and within the Phengaris-Maculinea species. We find a clear pattern between the clades recovered in the Glaucopsyche section phylogeny and their food-plant associations, with only the Phengaris-Maculinea clade utilising more than one plant family. Maculinea is, for the first time, recovered with strong support as a monophyletic group nested within Phengaris, with the closest relative being the rare genus Caerulea. The genus Glaucopsyche is polyphyletic, including the genera Sinia and lolana. Interestingly, we find evidence for additional potential cryptic species within the highly endangered Maculinea, which has long been suspected from morphological, ecological and molecular studies. (C) 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available