Inferring the invasion history of coral berry Ardisia crenata from China to the USA using molecular markers

Abstract

Genetic comparisons between native and invasive populations of a species can provide insights into its invasion history information, which is useful for guiding management and control strategies. The coral berry Ardisia crenata was introduced to Florida last century as a cultivated ornament plant, and has since spread widely throughout the southern regions of the USA. Previously, the genetic variation among 20 natural populations of A. crenata across its distribution center in southern China was quantified using seven microsatellite markers. Here we expand on that work by additionally sampling individuals from four other native populations in Taiwan and Japan, and from five invasive populations in the USA. We also examined the results from one chloroplast intergenic spacer region (trnF‐trnL) in all 29 populations. Our aim is to identify the invasion source and subsequent history of the species’ spread throughout the southern USA. We observed lower genetic diversity in the invasive populations based on both microsatellite and chloroplast markers. Our data show that the invasive populations can be clustered with native populations in southeastern China, inferring this region as the geographic origin of A. crenata cultivars invading the USA. We further classified invasive individuals into invasive I and invasive II clusters. Nantou in Taiwan and Xihu in mainland China are the most closely related populations to those, which identify the former as potential sources for host‐specific control agents. Our results, combined with the known introduction records, suggest that A. crenata was first multiply introduced into Florida and then secondarily colonized Louisiana and Texas from Florida.

Complete Plastid Genome Sequence of the Basal Asterid Ardisia polysticta Miq. and Comparative Analyses of Asterid Plastid Genomes

“…Surprisingly, several plastome markers commonly used for molecular phylogenetics of asterids at low taxonomic levels, such as regions between trnT - UGU and trnF - GAA [20], [28], [62], [63] and between atpB and rbcL [63], [64], [65], are not included in this list. To resolve interspecific relationships in a speciose genus such as Ardisia , suitable markers should be variable and, at the same time, encompass a region of adequate length, so that there will be sufficient characters.…”

“…crenata has the longest history of cultivation – nearly 200 years since its first description as an ornamental [19]. It also has attracted great attention for being an invasive species in the USA [20]. The species chosen in this study, A .…”

“…These SSR markers can also supplement previous studies on the expansion history of invasive A . crenata populations such as that by Niu et al [20], which used the largely invariable trnL - trnF as the only plastome marker. Due to their maternal inheritance, both the Ardisia -specific fast evolving regions and SSRs in the plastome could also assist in the characterization, parent identification, and selection of new cultivars of Ardisia ornamentals.…”

Cryptic genetic subdivision in the San Benito evening primrose (Camissonia benitensis)

“…We are not aware of any simulations looking at the effect of null alleles on InStruct sample assignment. However, sample assignment by STRUCTURE is robust to null alleles (Carlsson 2008) and other studies have found very similar results between the programs (Gunn et al 2011;Tatarenkov et al 2007), even when there is some evidence of null alleles (Niu et al 2012). For both analyses, the actual number of population clusters that best fit the data was calculated using the Dk method of Evanno et al (2005) in STRUCTURE Harvester (Earl and vonHoldt 2012) or by hand using the likelihood values.…”

Selective herbicides for control of hen’s eyes (Ardisia crenata) in forests and natural areas

“…Hen's eyes (Ardisia crenata Sims), also known as coral ardisia, was introduced into Florida as an ornamental shrub in the early 1900s (Dozier 1999;Hutchinson et al 2011;Niu et al 2012;Sellers et al 2007). There are more than 500 species within the genus Ardisia that are native to tropical and subtropical regions of eastern Asia, where some are ornamental or used for food and medicine (Hutchinson et al 2011;Kobayashi and de Mejía 2005).…”