Glacial survival may matter after all: nunatak signatures in the rare European populations of two west-arctic species

Abstract

Biogeographers claimed for more than a century that arctic plants survived glaciations in ice-free refugia within the limits of the North European ice sheets. Molecular studies have, however, provided overwhelming support for postglacial immigration into northern Europe, even from the west across the Atlantic. For the first time we can here present molecular evidence strongly favouring in situ glacial persistence of two species, the rare arctic-alpine pioneer species Sagina caespitosa and Arenaria humifusa. Both belong to the 'west-arctic element' of amphi-Atlantic disjuncts, having their few and only European occurrences well within the limits of the last glaciation. Sequencing of non-coding regions of chloroplast DNA revealed only limited variation. However, two very distinct and partly diverse genetic groups, one East and one West Atlantic, were detected in each species based on amplified fragment length polymorphisms (AFLPs), excluding postglacial dispersal from North America as explanation for their European occurrences. Patterns of genetic diversity and distinctiveness indicate that glacial populations existed in East Greenland and/or Svalbard (A. humifusa) and in southern Scandinavia (S. caespitosa). Despite their presumed lack of long-distance dispersal adaptations, intermixed populations in several regions indicate postglacial contact zones. Both species are declining in Nordic countries, probably due to climate change-induced habitat loss. Little or no current connectivity between their highly fragmented and partly distinct populations call for conservation of several populations in each geographic region.