Molecular phylogenetics of flowering plant Annonaceae using big data

The Annonaceae, the largest family in the early-divergent order Magnoliales, comprises 107 genera and c. 2,400 species.The family contributes significantly to tree diversity in rain forests around the world and is one of the best examples to study the evolutionary history of tropical rain forest ecosystem. Despite significant advances in understanding molecular phylogentic relationships within this family over the past decade, the affinities of several clades remain obscure due to limited data used. In this project, we will use a super-matrix method with eight chloroplast DNA regions of about 800 species to reconstruct phylogenetic trees. In addition, this project will focus on nuclear marker development by transcriptome sequencing. The phylogenetic utility of developed markers will be evaluated and selected to design probes for targeted next generation sequencing for some poorly resolved lineages. The resultant phylogeny will provide a framework to test evolutionary hypotheses in morphological character evolution, historical biogeography, diversification rate estimation and pollination ecology.