Preliminary study on molecular phylogenetic relationship of Melastoma（Melastomataceae）based on rpl16 sequence

In order to figure out the systematic relationship of Melastoma plants native to China，which has been in debate for long，cp-rpl16 sequence was used to study the molecular phylogenetic relationship of Melastoma using 4 species from 3 genera of Melastomataceae as outgroup. The results showed that there was not enough variation sites on rpl16 sequence in the plants studied. In the molecular phylogenetic tree constructed by Maximum parsimony，M. dodecandrum was divided into a separate clade. In the molecular phylogenetic tree constructed by Bayesian Inference，all species of genus Melastoma were clustered into one clade. Every genus of Melastomataceae could form a separate clade in both molecular phylogenetic trees. To sum up，rpl16 sequence is not proper for the molecular phylogenetic relationship study among species of Melastoma，but maybe it is suitable for the molecular phylogenetic relationship study among genera of Melastomataceae