Herendeen and Clark The genus Alloplectus, a common shrub from the northwestern Andes, has flowers that may be viewed as an upside down version of those of the Florists' Gloxinia. Alloplectus and the Florists' Gloxinia both belong to the same group, but the flowers are resupinate (inverted) in some species of Alloplectus. This project will look at the pattern of diversification in Alloplectus and related members of the family Gesneriaceae and the evolution of flower resupination in this group. The Neotropical members of Gesneriaceae are problematic because morphological details are poorly documented, closely related taxa exhibit a wide range of flower forms, pollinators are poorly known, and molecular phylogenies have insufficient species sampling to clarify the wide range of morphological variation. One of the least understood groups of Neotropical gesneriads is the genus Alloplectus. This project will generate phylogenetic hypotheses to test competing theories of gesneriad evolution, to resolve phylogenetic relationships within the tribe Episcieae, and to complete a taxonomic revision of the genus. Field expeditions will be carried out in Bolivia and Panama to study the plants and their pollinators and collect material for study in the laboratory and herbarium. Visits to European herbaria will be conducted to study historical and recent plant collections. Molecular sequence data will be collected for the nuclear ITS region and the chloroplast trnL intron and spacer. Morphological characters will be studied and scored for phylogenetic analyses. Although tropical ecosystems are attracting increasing attention from biologists and conservationists interested in understanding and managing the earth's biological resources, there is much that is not understood about the diversity of plants and other organisms that make up these ecosystems. For example, there are at least five species of Alloplectus that are new to science and many members of this group are geographically restricted and live in forests that are threatened by logging and agricultural conversion. Results from this project will provide a robust phylogenetic hypothesis and data that may be used to address questions about plant diversity and conservation, morphological evolution, and pollination biology in this poorly known group of tropical plants.
