Evolutionary History and Biogeography of the Australian Bitter-peas (Daviesia:Fabaceae)

Australia has a unique heritage of biodiversity that has evolved in isolation for millions of years. A key to understanding the origins of this diversity is biogeography, i.e. the study of the distribution of the living flora in the landscape. Biogeography becomes truly historical (with a time dimension), when phylogenies (reconstructed evolutionary histories) of plant groups are used to analyse distribution patterns. Very few relevant phylogenies are available. This project aims to reconstruct the phylogeny of the legume genus (Daviesia) and to use it to construct and test hypotheses on the biogeographical evolution of the Australian flora.