Towards a monophyletic Melicope (Rutaceae): Phylogenetic placement of Dutailliopsis and other New Caledonian genera, and an updated infrageneric classification of Melicope

2025/07/10 by Marc S. Appelhans, Yohan Pillon, Karine Gotty +1 · 1 voice
Agricultural and Biological Sciences · Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · #Plant Diversity and Evolution #Plant and Fungal Species Descriptions #Plant and animal studies

paper · pdf · doi:10.3897/phytokeys.259.139246

openalex publication_date 2025/07/10 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/02

Abstract

Dutailliopsis (Rutaceae) is a scarcely known monotypic genus from New Caledonia. It is one of the few genera of Rutaceae that has never been included in a molecular phylogenetic study. Based on Sanger sequencing of the markers ETS, ITS, and trn L- trn F, we conclude that Dutailliopsis is nested within the large genus Melicope and that it is most closely related to other New Caledonian species of Melicope . Previous molecular phylogenetic studies revealed that other New Caledonian genera – namely the endemic Comptonella , Dutaillyea , Picrella , and the near-endemic Sarcomelicope (only one out of the nine species is not endemic to New Caledonia) – are nested in Melicope as well and we propose nomenclatural changes to render Melicope monophyletic and develop a new classification system for the genus.

Citations

• MrBayes 3.2: Efficient Bayesian Phylogenetic Inference and Model Choice Across a Large Model Space
• A new subfamily classification of the Citrus family (Rutaceae) based on six nuclear and plastid markers
• Melicope iolensis (Rutaceae), a new tree species from Kaua‘i, Hawaiian Islands
• Universal primers for amplification of three non-coding regions of chloroplast DNA

Discussions

• Researchers unite Dutailliopsis with several former New Caledonian plant genera into a single, monophyletic Melicope. doi.org/10.3897/phyt... [bsky, 2 points, 0 comments]

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