Campanula ramosissima subsp. megapetala, a new subspecies of Campanula sect. Decumbentes (Campanulaceae) revealed by morphological and genetic analyses

Abstract

Campanula hawkinsiana and C. ramosissima are among the poorly investigated Campanula species distributed in the Balkan Peninsula. According to recent phylogenetic studies these species are closely related, and they belong to the section Decumbentes along with the two species from the Iberian Peninsula. However, none of these published studies included a larger number of populations of C. hawkinsiana and C. ramosissima, nor were they studied in detail at the morphological level. During our floristic investigations in the Balkan Peninsula, we observed a great morphological variability within the populations of C. ramosissima. The most morphologically specific and diverse are C. ramosissima populations from Montenegro. Considering all this, in this study, both molecular (AFLP fingerprinting and DNA sequencing) and classical morphometric analyses were applied with the aim to get insight into the genetic diversity and morphological variability of the populations from Montenegro and geographically close populations of both species from the section Decumbentes in the western part of the Balkan Peninsula. Significant morphological differences and a distinct position based on molecular phylogenetic evidence indicate that the plants from Montenegro should be recognized as a new subspecies, described here as Campanula ramosissima subsp. megapetala subsp. nov.