1 Phylogeography of a gypsum endemic plant across its entire distribution 2 range in the western Mediterranean 3 Mario Blanco-Sánchez1*, Michael J. Moore2, Marina Ramos-Muñoz1, Beatriz Pías3, Alfredo 4 García-Fernández1, María Prieto1, Lidia Plaza1, Ignacio Isabel1, Adrián Escudero1 and Silvia 5 Matesanz1 6 7 1 Área de Biodiversidad y Conservación, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos. C/ Tulipán s/n, 28933, 8 Móstoles, Spain. 9 2 Department of Biology, Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio 44074, U.S.A. 10 3 Departamento de Biodiversidad, Ecología y Evolución. Universidad Complutense de Madrid. 11 C/José Antonio Nováis 2, 28040, Madrid, Spain. 12 *Author for correspondence:
[email protected] 13 14 Manuscript received _______; revision accepted _______. 15 16 Running head: Phylogeography of a gypsum endemic plant 1 17 ABSTRACT 18 Premise of the study: Gypsum soils in the Mediterranean Basin house large numbers of edaphic 19 specialists that are adapted to stressful environments. The evolutionary history and standing 20 genetic variation of these taxa have been influenced by the geological and paleoclimatic 21 complexity of this area and the long-standing effect of human activities. However, little is 22 known about the origin of Mediterranean gypsophiles and the factors affecting their genetic 23 diversity and population structure. 24 Methods: Using phylogenetic and phylogeographic approaches based on microsatellites and 25 sequence data from nuclear and chloroplast regions, we evaluated the divergence time, genetic 26 diversity and population structure of 27 different populations of the widespread Iberian 27 gypsophile Lepidium subulatum throughout its entire geographic range. 28 Results: Lepidium subulatum diverged from its nearest relatives ~3 Mya, and the ITS and 29 psbA/matK trees supported the monophyly of the species.