Advances in phylogenomics have greatly clarified fern evolutionary relationships, yet significant gaps remain. In this study, we performed phylogenetic and phylogenomic analyses of Polypodiineae, one of the most species-rich suborders of Polypodiales, and found that Tectaria tenerifrons is a deeply diverged lineage. Our results support it as sister to Nephrolepidaceae in the plastome dataset, whereas the transcriptome dataset recovered it as sister to a clade comprising Nephrolepidaceae, Polypodiaceae, Davalliaceae, Oleandraceae, Tectariaceae s.l. No results support it as a member of the Tectariaceae, where it was previously classified. To reflect this deep divergence, we establish a new family, Cryptocaulaceae fam. nov., and a new monotypic genus, Cryptocaulon gen. nov, and propose the new combination Cryptocaulon tenerifrons comb. nov. Morphologically, Cryptocaulon can be distinguished from Tectaria by a combination of characters: long-creeping carnose rhizomes; subclathrate scales with multicellular hairs; anastomosing venation forming multiple rows of areoles without free included veinlets; basal veinlets of pinna lobes on the basiscopic side arising from the pinnule costule; cristate perispores with short, thick ridges; basic chromosome number, x = 41. We also designated a lectotype for C. tenerifrons.
Fujiwara et al. (Fri,) studied this question.
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