Editorial Preface to Special Issue: Exploring the impact of Andean uplift and climate on life evolution and landscape modification: From Amazonia to Patagonia

Genetic markers in Andean Puya species (Bromeliaceae) with implications on plastome evolution and phylogeny

“…Thus, the geographic patterns found in our study should be further investigated by an increased sampling, especially for those species distributed on the border of Chile. Moreover, although orogeny and climate change are often considered to be the major driving factors for the diversification of species in the high Andes (Hoorn et al, 2022), and the estimated divergence time in this study is consistent with these occurrences, other biotic factors (e.g., pollinator interactions and competition), likely contribute to the patterns found in this study. Future studies should include quantitative ecological approaches that will help discern additional potential sources of variation driving the diversification of Puya in the Andes.…”

Linking South American dry regions by the Gran Chaco: Insights from the evolutionary history and ecological diversification of Gomphrena s.str. (Gomphrenoideae, Amaranthaceae)

“…The results showed that the genus Gomphrena s.str. first diversified along the easternmost region of the eSADD (Brazilian Caatinga and Cerrado regions) and subsequently colonized the wSADD (Monte Desert, Puna, and Prepuna regions) around 5 Ma probably via the Gran Chaco, during the last Andean pulses and after the last marine transgressions (∼7 Ma; Ortiz‐Jaureguizar & Cladera, 2006; Hoorn et al, 2022). Following ancestral state reconstructions, diversification rate estimations, and climatic niche comparisons, we found that the colonization of this new arid environment implied an increase in the rate of diversification of annual over perennial species and progressive east–west differentiation of the occupied climatic niche.…”

“…We incorporated time‐stratified dispersal multiplier matrices in the model fitting to account for the changing distances between the regions over geological time. We constrained our analysis based on the most critical geoclimatic events during the Andean uplift pulses by dividing the multiplier matrix into four time periods: (i) 17.5–15.5 Ma, defined by the genus diversification (Ortuño & Borsch, 2020); (ii) 15.5–7 Ma, defined by the Middle and Late Miocene Atlantic marine transgressions recorded in southern South America (the “Paranaean Sea”) (Ortiz‐Jaureguizar & Cladera, 2006; Kessous et al, 2020); (iii) 7–2.5 Ma, defined by the culmination of the Andean uplift (Hoorn et al, 2022; Pérez‐Escobar et al, 2022); and (iv) 2.5–0.1 Ma, defined by the cyclical Pleistocene glaciations (Rabassa, 2008). The dispersal multiplier matrices for each of these strata give the relative probability of dispersal between areas and are roughly scaled to represent the relative distance between the areas during each time slice.…”

“…We, therefore, argue that the genus first diversified along the eastern South American drylands and subsequently colonized the western arid regions through the Gran Chaco as a biogeographical connection after Atlantic marine transgressions withdrew. Thus, our main expectations are that (i) the ancestral distribution range of the genus was composed of regions throughout eSADD; (ii) the species and clades that currently inhabit wSADD regions are young lineages within Gomphrena s.str., and diversified during the most recent Andean pulses (7–2.5 Ma; Hoorn et al, 2022; Pérez‐Escobar et al, 2022) and after marine transgressions (15.5–7 Ma; Ortiz‐Jaureguizar & Cladera, 2006); (iii) the ancestors of wSADD lineages were in the Gran Chaco; (iv) there were morphological, physiological, and climatic niche changes between lineages inhabiting the different SADDs; and (v) there was a change in the diversification rates during colonization of the new wSADD environments. To test these predictions, we reproduced the existent dated phylogeny of Gomphrena s.str.…”