Revealing systematic affinities of some Alchemilla (Rosaceae) species in the flora of Mongolia based on molecular phylogenetic analyses

The number of species in the genus Alchemilla fluctuates greatly, as many agamospermous microspecies have been described based on minor morphological differences. There are eleven species of Alchemilla in the flora of Mongolia, but some of which are not clearly distinct in their morphology and spatial distributions. To assess the genetic relatedness between such closely related species, we analysed the variation among seven species occurring mostly in central Mongolia. We aimed to reveal the systematic affinities of Mongolian species in the molecular phylogeny of this genus. Maximum likelihood, maximum parsimony and neighbor joining analyses were performed using nuclear (ITS) and chloroplast (trnL-F, matK) genome sequence data. According to the molecular and morphological data, the studied species were grouped together with species of the Lobed-clade. The differences between species that are not clearly distinct in terms of morphology and spatial distribution are largely unsupported by molecular data. The species status of Alchemilla changaica, A. gubanovii, and A. pavlovii should be reconsidered.