February 28th, 2014
By Gitzendanner, Matt
The Soltis Lab
Scientists and students in the Soltis Lab are currently working with a variety of technologies to investigate mechanisms of speciation, evolutionary relationships and character evolution in flowering and land plants at all taxonomic levels. Current projects include the study of higher level phylogenetic relationships and character evolution in the angiosperms, floral evolution, the genetic and genomic consequences of polyploidy, conservation genetics of rare plants, phylogeography, and biogeography. Please explore our website for more information on our research.
Biodiversity Science and the Twenty-First Century Workforce
December 18th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
The C-Fern (Ceratopteris richardii) genome: insights into plant genome evolution with the first partial homosporous fern genome assembly
December 6th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Predicting the Impact of Describing New Species on Phylogenetic Patterns
November 13th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Phylotranscriptomic analyses reveal asymmetrical gene duplication dynamics and signatures of ancient polyploidy in mints
November 13th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Access to RNA-sequencing data from 1,173 plant species: The 1000 Plant transcriptomes initiative (1KP)
November 13th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
One thousand plant transcriptomes and the phylogenomics of green plants
November 13th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Leebens-Mack, J. H., M. S. Barker, E. J. Carpenter, M. K. Deyholos, M. A. Gitzendanner, and One Thousand Plant Transcriptomes Initiative. 2019. One thousand plant transcriptomes and the phylogenomics of green plants. Nature, doi: 
Effects of taxon sampling and tree reconstruction methods on phylodiversity metrics
November 13th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Natural selection and repeated patterns of molecular evolution following allopatric divergence
November 13th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Phylogenetic relationships of Coreanomecon (Papaveraceae: Chelidonioideae) inferred from seed morphology and nrITS sequence data
November 13th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Rates of niche and phenotype evolution lag behind diversification in a temperate radiation
May 20th, 2019By Gitzendanner, Matt
Significance
Ancestral reconstruction across Saxifragales for PC1 of our dataset of 35 environmental variables; branches are colored in a rainbow scale from low ordinated values (red and yellow; hotter and to some extent wetter habitats, as well as the hottest arid habitats) to high ordinated values (green and blue; mostly colder and drier habitats). Black dots at nodes represent major ecological niche shifts (the upper 95th percentile of node–parent node differences). Red dots at nodes represent diversification shifts in the maximum credibility set. The inset density curves show tip rates for diversification (green), niche (orange), and phenotype (blue), all scaled from the minimum to the maximum reconstructed value. Around the edge are photographs of major representative habitats. Family codes are as follows: (a) Peridiscaceae, (b) Paeoniaceae, (c) Daphniphyllaceae, (d) Cercidiphyllaceae, (e) Altingiaceae, (f) Hamamelidaceae, (g) Iteaceae, (h) Grossulariaceae, (i) Saxifragaceae, (j) Cynomoriaceae, (k) Tetracarpaeaceae, (l) Aphanopetalaceae, (m) Penthoraceae, (n) Haloragaceae, and (o) Crassulaceae.
Alternative models of evolutionary processes suggest different associations between species diversification and trait evolution, but limited empirical evidence is available to test these models across large clades at global extents. Here we investigate the relative timing of species diversification and niche and phenotypic evolution across a global plant radiation (Saxifragales) with enormous phenotypic and habitat variation. We demonstrate strong temporal lags among rates, with increased diversification occurring first, followed by niche and phenotype. Accelerated diversification rates are coincident with mid-Miocene expansion of temperate biomes. Later increases in niche and phenotypic evolutionary rates argue against density-dependent diversification alone, indicating a major role for ecological opportunity. These results have broad implications for understanding diversification processes and the origin of present-day temperate biotas.