Format: ORAL

Lorena Endara1 Jana URen2 Gordon Burleigh3

1 Department of Biological Sciences, Clemson University, Clemson, South Carolina, USA 2 Department of Plant Pathology, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington, USA 3 Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA

Scaphosepalum is a comparatively small orchid lineage (ca. 53 spp.) within the diverse Neotropical orchid subtribe Pleurothallidinae. Species within the genus are primarily restricted to microhabitats in Central Americas and the northern Andes premontane and montane forests. We use targeted enrichment data generated with the GoFlag 408 angiosperm probe set to infer the phylogeny of Scaphosepalum to test the monophyly of the genus and elucidate relationships within Scaphosepalum previously unresolved by Sanger sequencing. These data produced a strongly supported tree that illuminates our understanding of species circumscriptions, especially for groups (i.e., Scaphosepalum antenniferum, S. breve, S. swertiifolium) where a mosaic distribution of phenotypic characters has been confounding and has resulted in species over description. This well-resolved phylogenetic tree represents a fundamental tool towards a better understanding of the evolutionary and ecological drivers that led to the diversification of this orchid group. We also discuss insights from the first Scaphosepalum genome and metagenomic sampling of microbial communities within the flowers of Scaphosepalum.