Taxonomic significance of morphological and molecular variation in Egyptian Malvaceae species

Abstract Background This study examined the morphological characters and molecular analysis of 15 species belonging to eight genera of the family Malvaceae, collected from different localities in Egypt. The study focused on investigating the relations between the species based on evidence of macro- and micro-morphological characters and molecular analysis. Since species identification and classification are highly dependent on morphological traits. Results The macro- and micro-morphology characters were used in analyzing the relationship among the studied species viz., habit, and nature of stem, type of stipule, type of lamina, inflorescence type, staminal tube, stigma type, and pollen grain sculpture. Furthermore, with the SCoT technique, differences in molecular markers were detected. In the start codon targeted SCOT analysis, eight SCoT primers were independently used. The total number of amplified fragments by all primers in the studied species was 100 fragments, including 51 polymorphic fragments with a ratio of 51%. The highest polymorphism among the studied species 72.73% was observed with the SCoT-06 primer. The lowest polymorphism 16.67% was obtained in the SCoT-07 primer. In three SCoT primers, SCoT-01, SCoT-06, and SCoT-10, no unique fragments were detected, while the other five primers yielded one unique band. In addition, the results of the phylogenetic tree constructed based on the similarity coefficient revealed by SCoT analysis confirm the macro and micro-morphological analysis findings. Conclusion Generally, these data of morphological characters and molecular analysis support the resolution and identification of closely related Malvaceae species and offer insight into their phylogenetic relationships. This, in turn, supports previous taxonomic revisions in Malvaceae.