Graduate student Paul Manos proposes an analysis of the evolutionary relationships among oak species in the western U.S. using morphological characters, pollen features, enzyme electrophoresis, and chloroplast DNA sequence data. Hybridization among oak species has obscured the delimitation among species, and this project addresses the problem by studying pairs of parental species in the western U.S. and narrow pair-wise hybrid zones on the Channel Islands. Higher-level relationships with other members of the family Fagaceae will also be explored. The proposed analysis will clarify our understanding of oak classification, and will provide new insight into relationship between morphological and molecular evolution in woody plants. Oaks have a rich fossil record, and the proposed research will shed new light on the significance of evolutionary changes recorded in fossils.
