PMC4111349_01
Distribution of the analyzed populations of the Ranunculus auricomus complex.. Dots represent sampled populations, the areas with the same color show the entire distribution of the respective taxon within Central Europe (after).
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The most plausible explanation is that R. variabilis has introgressed into R. notabilis in early sexual hybrid generations, or also recently via backcrossing as the pollen donor, which is reasonable from the overlap of distribution areas (Figure 1) and the co-occurrence of the two taxa in some of the sites.
NeighborNet analysis of interspecific ITS1+ITS2 variability within the Ranunculus auricomus complex.. NeighborNet analysis of all ITS1+ITS2 sequences obtained by direct sequencing of the studied individuals. The spring leaf silhouettes illustrate the main phenotypic differences between the two morphotypes: the auricomus-morphotype (characteristic for R. notabilis, R. variabilis and the synthetic hybrid R. cassubicifolius x notabilis) and the cassubicus-morphotype (i.e., R. carpaticola and R. cassubicifolius). Individuals belonging to R. carpaticola are marked as "P", R. cassubicifolius as "S", R. notabilis as "N" and R. variabilis as "V", respectively. Identical sequences representing the same ribotype are listed in Figure 3. Bootstrap values are given for the main clusters.
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Additionally, the patterns of methylation-induced substitutions or GC content variation (Figure S2) both seem to be insufficiently informative to separate between functional and non-functional/artificial ITS copies.