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Creators/Authors contains: "Neubig, Kurt M"

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  1. Free, publicly-accessible full text available July 1, 2025
  2. Abstract—The diverse and spectacular Hibisceae tribe comprises over 750 species. No studies, however, have broadly sampled across the dozens of genera in the tribe, leading to uncertainty in the relationships among genera. The non-monophyly of the genusHibiscusis infamous and challenging, whereas the monophyly of most other genera in the tribe has yet to be assessed, including the large genusPavonia.Here we significantly increase taxon sampling in the most complete phylogenetic study of the tribe to date. We assess monophyly of most currently recognized genera in the tribe and include three and thirteen newly sampled sections ofHibiscusandPavonia,respectively. We also include five rarely sampled genera and 137 species previously unsampled. Our phylogenetic trees demonstrate thatHibiscus, as traditionally defined, encompasses at least 20 additional genera. The status ofPavoniaemerges as comparable in complexity toHibiscus. We offer clarity in the phylogenetic placement of several taxa of uncertain affinity (e.g.Helicteropsis,Hibiscadelphus, Jumelleanthus,andWercklea). We also identify two new clades and elevate them to the generic rank with the recognition of two new monospecific genera: 1)BlanchardiaM.M.Hanes & R.L.Barrett is a surprising Caribbean lineage that is sister to the entire tribe, and 2)AstrohibiscusMcLay & R.L.Barrett represents former members ofHibiscus caesiuss.l.CraveniaMcLay & R.L.Barrett is also described as a new genus for theHibiscus panduriformisclade, which is allied toAbelmoschus. Finally, we introduce a new classification for the tribe and clarify the boundaries ofHibiscusandPavonia. 
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  3. Abstract PremiseTo date, phylogenetic relationships within the monogeneric Brunelliaceae have been based on morphological evidence, which does not provide sufficient phylogenetic resolution. Here we use target‐enriched nuclear data to improve our understanding of phylogenetic relationships in the family. MethodsWe used the Angiosperms353 toolkit for targeted recovery of exonic regions and supercontigs (exons + introns) from low copy nuclear genes from 53 of 70 species inBrunellia, and several outgroup taxa. We removed loci that indicated biased inference of relationships and applied concatenated and coalescent methods to inferBrunelliaphylogeny. We identified conflicts among gene trees that may reflect hybridization or incomplete lineage sorting events and assessed their impact on phylogenetic inference. Finally, we performed ancestral‐state reconstructions of morphological traits and assessed the homology of character states used to define sections and subsections inBrunellia. ResultsBrunelliacomprises two major clades and several subclades. Most of these clades/subclades do not correspond to previous infrageneric taxa. There is high topological incongruence among the subclades across analyses. ConclusionsPhylogenetic reconstructions point to rapid species diversification in Brunelliaceae, reflected in very short branches between successive species splits. The removal of putatively biased loci slightly improves phylogenetic support for individual clades. Reticulate evolution due to hybridization and/or incomplete lineage sorting likely both contribute to gene‐tree discordance. Morphological characters used to define taxa in current classification schemes are homoplastic in the ancestral character‐state reconstructions. While target enrichment data allows us to broaden our understanding of diversification inBrunellia, the relationships among subclades remain incompletely understood. 
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