Back

Reticulate evolution and climate driven diversification shaped the origin and geographic structure of Linum bienne

Landoni, B.; Viruel, J.; Bourgeois, Y.; Allaby, R. G.; Brennan, A. C.; Perez-Barrales, R.

2026-06-20 evolutionary biology
10.64898/2026.06.17.732954 bioRxiv
Show abstract

[vrecto] Hybridization, incomplete lineage sorting and climatic oscillations can interact across evolutionary timescales, but their combined effects on plant diversification remain difficult to resolve. We investigated how these processes shaped the origin and geographic structure of Linum bienne, the putative progenitor of cultivated flax. [vrecto]We integrated genus-level Angiosperms353 phylogenomics across Linum with plastome analyses, low-depth nuclear resequencing, demographic inference and environmental niche modelling across the range of L. bienne. This framework allowed us to assess phylogenetic discordance, test for reticulation and reconstruct lineage history through time. [vrecto]Phylogenetic discordance was widespread across our genus-level sampling and largely consistent with incomplete lineage sorting. However, branch-length and maximum-likelihood network analyses detected additional signal of gene flow at the node including L. bienne, cultivated flax and the closest relatives. Within L. bienne, plastid and nuclear data recovered four geographically structured lineages across the species range, with cytonuclear discordance and demographic analyses supporting repeated secondary contact. [vrecto]Our results show that the evolutionary history of L. bienne reflects the interaction between deep reticulation, incomplete lineage sorting and Pleistocene range dynamics. This multiscale perspective highlights L. bienne as a genetically complex species and illustrates how reticulate evolution and climatic change can jointly shape plant diversification.

Matching journals

The top 5 journals account for 50% of the predicted probability mass.

1
Current Biology
665 papers in training set
Top 0.4%
17.9%
2
New Phytologist
346 papers in training set
Top 0.4%
17.9%
3
Nature Communications
5641 papers in training set
Top 22%
7.6%
4
Annals of Botany
50 papers in training set
Top 0.2%
6.5%
5
Nature Plants
94 papers in training set
Top 0.5%
5.3%
50% of probability mass above
6
Molecular Biology and Evolution
542 papers in training set
Top 2%
4.2%
7
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
2444 papers in training set
Top 16%
3.3%
8
PLOS Biology
486 papers in training set
Top 2%
3.1%
9
Science
477 papers in training set
Top 3%
2.6%
10
Science Advances
1243 papers in training set
Top 15%
2.4%
11
Systematic Biology
144 papers in training set
Top 0.4%
2.4%
12
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
393 papers in training set
Top 3%
2.3%
13
eLife
5828 papers in training set
Top 45%
2.0%
14
PLOS Genetics
862 papers in training set
Top 8%
1.6%
15
The Plant Journal
215 papers in training set
Top 3%
1.4%
16
Journal of Systematics and Evolution
11 papers in training set
Top 0.1%
1.4%
17
PLANTS, PEOPLE, PLANET
27 papers in training set
Top 0.4%
1.4%
18
American Journal of Botany
47 papers in training set
Top 0.6%
1.3%
19
Genome Biology and Evolution
338 papers in training set
Top 3%
1.1%
20
Evolution Letters
85 papers in training set
Top 1%
1.1%
21
Communications Biology
993 papers in training set
Top 26%
1.0%
22
Nature
645 papers in training set
Top 9%
1.0%
23
Nature Genetics
286 papers in training set
Top 5%
0.8%
24
The Plant Cell
161 papers in training set
Top 2%
0.6%
25
PLOS ONE
5266 papers in training set
Top 66%
0.6%
26
Applications in Plant Sciences
23 papers in training set
Top 0.5%
0.6%