The origin of modern patterns of continental diversity in Mauritiinae palms: the Neotropical museum and the Afrotropical graveyard

While the latitudinal diversity gradient has received much attention, biodiversity and species richness also vary between continents across similar latitudes. Fossil information can be used to understand the evolutionary mechanisms that generated such variation between continents of similar latitudes. We integrated fossil data into a phylogenetic analysis of the Mauritiinae palms, whose extant diversity is restricted to the Neotropics, but extended across Africa and India during most of the Cenozoic. Mauritiinae diverged from its sister lineage Raphiinae ca 106 Ma. Using ancestral state estimation and a lineage through time analysis, we found that diversity arose globally during the late Cretaceous and Palaeocene across South America, Africa and India. The Palaeocene-Eocene transition (ca 56 Ma) marked the end of global Mauritiinae expansion, and the beginning of their decline in both Africa and India. Mauritiinae disappeared from the Indian subcontinent and Africa at the end of the Eocene and the Miocene, respectively. By contrast, Neotropical diversity steadily increased over the last 80 Myr. Taken together, our results suggest that the Neotropics functioned as a continental-scale refuge for Mauritiinae palms, where lineages survived and diversified while global climatic changes that drastically reduced rainforests led to their demise on other continents.

Stomatal CO2 responsiveness and photosynthetic capacity of tropical woody species in relation to taxonomy and functional traits

Stomatal CO2 responsiveness and photosynthetic capacity vary greatly among plant species, but the factors controlling these physiological leaf traits are often poorly understood. To explore if these traits are linked to taxonomic group identity and/or to other plant functional traits, we investigated the short-term stomatal CO2 responses and the maximum rates of photosynthetic carboxylation (V cmax) and electron transport (J max) in an evolutionary broad range of tropical woody plant species. The study included 21 species representing four major seed plant taxa: gymnosperms, monocots, rosids and asterids. We found that stomatal closure responses to increased CO2 were stronger in angiosperms than in gymnosperms, and in monocots compared to dicots. Stomatal CO2 responsiveness was not significantly related to any of the other functional traits investigated, while a parameter describing the relationship between photosynthesis and stomatal conductance in combined leaf gas exchange models (g 1) was related to leaf area-specific plant hydraulic conductance. For photosynthesis, we found that the interspecific variation in V cmax and J max was related to within leaf nitrogen (N) allocation rather than to area-based total leaf N content. Within-leaf N allocation and water use were strongly co-ordinated (r 2 = 0.67), such that species with high fractional N investments into compounds maximizing photosynthetic capacity also had high stomatal conductance. We conclude that while stomatal CO2 responsiveness of tropical woody species seems poorly related to other plant functional traits, photosynthetic capacity is linked to fractional within-leaf N allocation rather than total leaf N content and is closely co-ordinated with leaf water use.