Molecular phylogenetic analysis of the taxa belonging to the genus Carlina L.(Asteraceae) in Turkey

Asteraceae, is a cosmopolitan family in terms of natural chemistry, flowering morphology, and adaptation to habitat. Even if there are numerous taxonomic and new molecular phylogenetic studies, the ancestors of the Asteraceae family are not well defined. Study material under consideration, Carlina L., is a member of the tribe Cardueae which belong to Cichorioideaea subfamily of the Asteraceae. The genus Carlina is represented by C. lanata, C. vulgaris, C. tragacanthifolia, C. biebersteinii, C. intermedia, C. oligocephala, C. involucrata subsp. libanotica, C. corymbosa, C.graeca in The Flora of Turkey. In this study, molecular phylogenetic analysis of the genus Carlina, which has a natural distribution in Turkey, has been made. The DNA isolation was performed using phenol- chloroform- isoamylalcohol. ITS (Internal Transcribed Region) of the nuclear ribosomal DNA (nrDNA) and the trnL-F (Transfer RNA coding) region of the chloroplast DNA sequences were used as molecular markers. Carlina was selected as ingroup taxon and Cardopatium, Atractylis and Carthamus were outgroup taxa. Taxa belonging to the genus Carlina distributed in Turkey were analyzed phylogenetically using Branch-and-Bound algorithm with maximum parsimony criterion. Data set analysis using 952 best parsimony trees was made. One tree topology was the most reliable and clads have strongly Bootstrap support.