Floral disparity in the Mimoseae: distinct lineages from the same biomes shares the patterns of floral morphology?

• Grant number: 25/10473-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: July 01, 2025
• End date: June 30, 2026
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Botany - Plant Taxonomy
• Principal Investigator: Leonardo Maurici Borges
• Grantee: Beatriz Teixeira de Vasconcelos
• Host Institution: Centro de Ciências Biológicas e da Saúde (CCBS). Universidade Federal de São Carlos (UFSCAR). São Carlos , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 22/03046-0 - The role of modularity and integration in the evolution of plant morphological diversity, AP.PNGP.PI

Abstract

Morphological disparity is a fundamental tool for understanding evolutionary patterns and processes that shape biodiversity. Although widely applied in animals, this approach is still little explored in plants, especially in the context of floral morphology. This project aims to investigate the patterns of floral disparity in the Tribe Mimoseae (Leguminosae), a pantropical group with high ecological and phylogenetic diversity. The research will seek to answer how floral diversity is structured in the tribe, to what extent it is influenced by phylogenetic relationships and how geographic variations, especially biome transition events, affect morphological variation. In this sense, we ask what the patterns of floral disparity are acting, considering the occurrence in the same biome of independent lineages. To answer this question, morphology and occurrence data will be collected from the literature, and through multivariate and comparative analyses, hypotheses about the spatial compartmentalization of floral disparity will be tested in a comparative phylogenetic context. With this, we hope to understand whether and how the floral morphology of the tribe Mimoseae was shaped by environmental interactions and also provide new insights into processes governing the evolution of floral disparity. (AU)