Format: ORAL

Gulzar Khan, Raulf Baur, and Dirk C. Albach

Carl von Ossietzky Universität Oldenburg

Rhododendron (Ericaceae) is one of the largest genera of woody plants with 1156 species. The genus has been divided into five subgenera, of which R. subg. Pentanthera G. Don comprises a group of highly ornamental species, with interesting distribution, indigenous to North America, Japan, China, and the Caucasus regions. The species (17 species) assigned to R. section Pentanthera are commonly known as Azaleas. The section has highly debated taxonomy and unresolved phylogeny. We here used the GBS techniques to assess the spcecies boundries using the population and phylogenomic approaches. Our initial results suggest that their is frequent admixture among different species of R. section Penanthera. The initial phylogenomic results also support reticulation in the tree backbone of the section.