Corresponding author: Nicolás Lavandero (
Academic editor: P. de Lange
A new species,
Lavandero N, Rosende B, Pérez MF (2020)
The ecosystems found in central and southern Chile are one of 35 world biodiversity hotspots, owing to their combination of great diversity and high levels of endemism, and a past and ongoing loss of habitat and biodiversity (
The genus
In the context of the ongoing taxonomic revision of the genus, unusual specimens of
During the austral summer of 2019, a botanical exploration was made to the coastal mountain range of the Metropolitan Region of Chile, specifically to the Reserva Natural Altos de Cantillana (Fig.
Distribution map of
The assessment of the conservation status of the species was made using the International Union for Conservation of Nature (
DNA sequences for nDNA (
Total genomic DNA was extracted from silica-dried material collected in the field from the type specimen using the Qiagen DNeasy Plant Mini Kit (QIAGEN, Santiago, Chile) following the manufacturer’s instructions. Genomic DNA was used to amplify by PCR the internal transcribed spacer region (
The assembled sequences were aligned using the ClustalW algorithm in Geneious Prime 2019.1.1 (
The DNA matrix contained 2962 nucleotide characters (782
Phylogeny of
Chile. Región Metropolitana: Provincia de Melipilla, entre el límite de Alhué y Melipilla, Reserva Natural Altos de Cantillana,
Collected flowering and fruiting in December.
The specific epithet refers to the coastal mountain range where the species was found, Altos de Cantillana.
Leaf morphology and habit of acaulescent/subacaulescent
Habitat of
The caulescent herbs with lignified taproots and annual species are excluded. It is important to observe the belowground structures in fresh and dry specimens in order to correctly assign the species to this group. For the habit, please refer to the insets in Figure
1 | Plants densely tomentose, greyish; Corolla pink |
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– | Plants not densely tomentose, glabrous or glandulous; Corolla white to bluish |
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2 | Plants caespitose, up to 8 cm tall, glabrous to glabrescent |
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– | Plants erect or decumbent, taller than 8 cm, densely glandulous |
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3 | Lamina with foliar segments perpendicular or oblique to the axis of the lamina, non-prominent venation; flowers 40–60 per capitula, anther apical appendages greenish-yellow; Andes of Chile and Argentina above 3000 m.a.s.l. |
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– | Lamina flat with foliar segments on the same axis of the lamina, conspicuously prominent venation; flowers 27–30 per capitula; anther apical appendages purple. Coastal Cordillera of Chile near 2000 m.a.s.l. |
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The ability to establish infrageneric relationships using classic chloroplast markers and
From the biogeographic point of view, it is interesting to note that the closest species of
The discovery of this new species, which is restricted to mountain tops in the Cantillana Mountain Range in Central Chile, highlights the importance of this site in terms of its unique biodiversity. Cantillana harbours several taxa endemic to the Mediterranean region of Chile (
We are grateful to the curators and staff of CONC and SGO herbaria. We thank Gioconda Peralta and Loreto Carrasco of the Plataforma de Secuenciación y Tecnologías Ómicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile for laboratory support and expert capillary electrophoresis analysis (CONICYT–FONDEQUIP EQM150077). We would like to thank Prof. Sergei Mosyakin and one anonymous reviewer for the helpful comments on the submitted manuscript. Thanks to Fabiola Gamboa for providing photos of Altos de Cantillana. We are indebted to Martin Gardner (RBGE), who carefully revised the manuscript. We would like to thank Sebastian Teillier for his helpful comments on the manuscript and his keen interest in the flora of the Metropolitan Region. We would like to thank the logistic support from “Proyecto GEF 5135” MMA and ONU Medio Ambiente, that invited us to participate in their floristic survey in their permanent plots of flora in Altos de Cantillana, part of the SIMBIO RMS. Herbarium and lab work were funded by the Comisión Nacional de Investigación Científica y Tecnológica (CONICYT) from the Government of Chile (Fondecyt grant 1171369). Special thanks to Corporación Altos de Cantillana for the logistic support in the field and all the hard work they do to keep this Natural Reserve preserved.
Table S1. GenBank accession numbers used in this study
molecular data
GenBank accession numbers for the