Towards a monophyletic classification of Cardueae: restoration of the genus Lophiolepis (= Cirsium p.p.) and new circumscription of Epitrachys

Abstract

Using molecular data and representative species coverage, we confirmed the monophyly of Cirsium sect. Eriolepis and, therefore, we propose to treat it as a separate genus (Lophiolepis). Besides, based on molecular and morphological evidence we segregate Cirsium italicum into the separate genus Epitrachys, sister to a large clade including Carduus, Cirsium s.l. and several allied genera. The name of a new hybrid genus (Lophiocirsium) is also published. Overall, 129 new combinations in Lophiolepis one in Epitrachys and one in Lophiocirsium are proposed.

Keywords:

• Asteraceae
• Eriolepis
• nomenclatural changes
• resurrected genus
• taxonomy

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to J. McNeill (Edinburgh) and J. H. Wiersema (Washington, D.C.) for their invaluable suggestions. We thank the curators of E, FI, NAP, PAL, and PESA for sending plant material for DNA extraction. We thank to J. Šmerda and C. Marcenò (Masaryk Univ., Brno, Czech Republic) for providing photos of Epitrachys italica and Lophiolepis vallis-demonii. Computational resources were supplied by the project "e-Infrastruktura CZ" (e-INFRA CZ LM2018140, supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic) and by the ELIXIR-CZ project (LM2018131), part of the international ELIXIR infrastructure.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 According to the birth record in a church book (Mährisch Weisskirchen – currently Hranice na Moravě in the Czech Republic), Franz Petrak was born as František Petrák. However, he spent substantial part of his life in Vienna as a herbarium curator in Naturhistorischesmuseum and used the German orthography "Franz Petrak" against the Czech "František Petrák". Therefore we respected his choice.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded in part by the “Progetto di Ricerca di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale” (PRIN) “PLAN.T.S. 2.0—towards a renaissance of PLANt Taxonomy and Systematics” led by the University of Pisa, under the grant number 2017JW4HZK.