Composition of the Lecointea clade (Leguminosae, Papilionoideae, Swartzieae), a Re-Evaluation Based on Combined Evidence from Morphology and Molecular Data

We investigated morphological and DNA sequence data for studying the composition and phylogenetic relatonship of the Lecointea clade sensu Herendeen and for testing its monophyly. Twenty nine representing 14 genera were analyzed, including all members of the Lecointea clade and some species of the genera Acosmium, Luetzelburgia, Sweetia, Vatairea and Vataireopsis. Ateleia herbert-smithii, Bocoa mollis, and Myrocarpus frondosus were included as outgroup. Matrices were analyzed using maximum parsimony. Analyses of morphological data, chloroplast DNA trnL sequence data, and combined datasets resulted in similar tree topologies. The Lecointea clade sensu Herendeen, with the additional inclusion of Uribea, is monophyletic in all analyses. Exostyles and Harleyodendron belong to the Lecointea clade and not to the Vatairea clade as recently proposed by Pennington & al.