蕨类植物起源与系统发生关系研究进展

蕨类植物是一群非常古老的植物,在其漫长的演化历史中丢失了大量的系统发生信息,因此重建其系统演化关系是蕨类植物学家所面临的重要任务之一.近年来的分子系统学研究已经确立了一些类群的系统关系,但现存的蕨类分类系统和系统发生关系还有很多谜团有待揭开.化石记录表明蕨类植物最早出现于大约4亿多年前,但大部分现代真蕨类缺少足够的化石证据.它们的起源时间和方式及其内部各类群的系统发生关系等诸多问题的解决,还有待于大量形态学和不同分子水平上的实验数据的进一步积累,并结合其直接的化石证据进行综合研究.

Advances in the Studies of the Origin and Systematics of Pteridophytes

Pteridophytes have a longer evolutionary history and have endured greater losses ofphylogenetical information than spermatophytes. Therefore, reconstructing the evolutionary his-tory of pteridophytes has been a challenge to systematists. Recently, combined molecular and mor-phological studies confirm the systematic positions of some lineages of pteridophytes. The emer-gence of early pteridophyte was traced back more than 400 million years ago, but many taxa lackedfossil records. So, questions remain unsolved regarding the origin time and pattern of pteridophyteand the internal phylogeny of its members. It is suggested that future studies of the origin andevolution of pteridophytes place emphasis on synthetic analysis of morphology, stratigraphicsequences, and multi-gene systematics.