A PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF THE LAURENCIA COMPLEX (RHODOMELACEAE) OF THE RED ALGAE

A phylogenetic analysis of 29 species from the Laurencia complex was c arried out based on 36 morphological and developmental characters. Tax a included nine species of subgenus Laurencia, 12 species of subgenus Chondrophycus and eight species of Osmundea. Chondria was the outgroup . Characters were associated with ecology(1 character), vegetative fea tures (17 characters), male reproduction (8 characters), female reprod uction and carposporophytes (3 characters) and tetrasporangia (7 chara cters). Twelve most parsimonious trees were produced with treelength o f 148. Three large clades were resolved that corresponded to Osmundea, Laurencia subgenus Laurencia and Laurencia subgenus Chondrophycus. Su bgenus Chondrophycus was resolved as the sister group of Osmundea. The position of L. translucida Fujii & Cordeiro-Marino is problematic, bu t it is probably allied to Chondrophycus. Chondrophycus is raised to g eneric rank and 12 new combinations in Chondrophycus are proposed.