Molecular Systematics of Bryophytes: Progress, Problems and Perspectives, was an internationally attended symposium held at the Missouri Botanical Garden, September 6 and 7, 2003.

The conference was organized by Bernard Goffinet from the University of Connecticut and Robert Magill, Director of Research at the Missouri Botanical Garden, with sponsorship from the Garden and the Deep Gene Research Coordination Network. Attendees from a dozen countries, representing a global bryological community, participated in the event.

The symposium program featured twenty-nine speakers discussing various aspects of the molecular systematics of bryophytes (mosses, liverworts, and hornworts). The result of this gathering of imminent botanical researchers is the book now before you, twenty-one chapters divided into five areas of concentration: (1) Bryophytes and Evolution of Land Plants; (2) Hornwort Phylogeny; (3) Liverwort Phylogeny; (4) Moss Phylogeny; and (5) Phylogeography.

Molecular Systematics of Bryophytes, edited by Bernard Goffinet, Victoria Hollowell, and Robert Magill, is published as Volume 98 of the Missouri Botanical Garden’s Monographs in Systematic Botany series.

Included in this volume:

Inferring phylogeny using genomic characters: a case study using land plant plastomes - Dean G. Kelch, Amy Driskell, and Brent Mishler

Molecular evolution of the chloroplast trnL-F region in land plants - Dietmar Quandt, Kai Müller, Michael Stech, Jan-Peter Frahm, Wolfgang Frey, Khidir W. Hilu, and Thomas Borsch

Hornwort phylogeny

Phylogenetic relationships of the hornworts based on rbcL sequence data: novel relationships and new insights - R. Joel Duff, Dale Christine Cargill, Juan Carlos Villarreal, and Karen S. Renzaglia

Liverwort phylogeny

A molecular phylogeny of leafy liverworts (Jungermanniidae: Marchantiophyta) - E. Christine Davis

Phylogeny of liverworts---beyond a leaf and a thallus - Xiaolan He-Nygrén, Inkeri Ahonen, Aino Juslén, David Glenny, and Sinikka Piippo

A phylogeny of the simple thalloid liverworts (Jungermanniopsida, Metzgeriidae) as inferred from five chloroplast genes - Laura L. Forrest and Barbara J. Crandall-Stotler

Phylogenetic relationships between Lophoziaceae and Scapaniaceae based on chloroplast sequences - Daniela B. Schill, David G. Long, Michael Moeller, and Jane Squirrell

On phylogeny of Lophoziaceae and related families (Hepaticae, Jungermanniales) based on trnL-trnF intron-spacer sequences of chloroplast DNA - Svetlana P. Yatsentyuk, Nadezhda A. Konstantinova, Michael S. Ignatov, Jaakko Hyvönen, and Aleksey V. Troitsky

Molecular phylogeny of the liverwort order Porellales (Marchantiophyta, Jungermanniopsida) - Inkeri Ahonen

Phylogeny of Lejeuneaceae: a cladistic analysis of chloroplast gene rbcL sequences and morphology with preliminary comments on the mitochondrial nad4-2 spacer region - Rosemary Wilson, S. Robbert Gradstein, Jochen Heinrichs, Henk Groth, Anna Luiza Ilkiu-Borges, and Florian A. Hartmann

Moss phylogeny

Systematics of Bryophyta (mosses): from molecules to a revised classification - Bernard Goffinet and William R. Buck

Diversification of peatmosses: a phylogenetic approach - A. Jonathan Shaw, Cymon J. Cox, and Iwona Melosik

Pogonatum (Polytrichales, Bryophyta) revisited - Satu Koskinen and Jaakko Hyvönen

Phylogenetic inferences in the Orthotrichoideae (Orthotrichaceae, Bryophyta) based on variation in four loci from all genomes - Bernard Goffinet, A. Jonathan Shaw, Cymon J. Cox, Norman J. Wickett, and Sandra B. Boles

Systematic studies of non-Hypnanaean pleurocarps: establishing a phylogenetic framework for investigating the origins of pleurocarpy - Neil E. Bell and Angela E. Newton

Phylogeny and evolution of epiphytism in the three moss families Meteoriaceae, Brachytheciaceae, and Lembophyllaceae - Sanna Huttunen, Michael S. Ignatov, Kai Müller, and Dietmar Quandt

Phylogeography

Phylogeny and biogeography of Plagiochila (Plagiochilaceae) based on nuclear and chloroplast DNA sequences - Henk Groth, Melanie Lindner, and Jochen Heinrichs

Mosses surviving on the edge: origins, genetic diversity, and mutation in Antarctica - Mary L. Skotnicki, Anne Mackenzie, and Patricia M. Selkirk

Organellar inheritance in the allopolyploid liverwort species Porella baueri (Porellaceae): reconstructing historical events using DNA analysis data - Kamila Jankowiak and Zofia Szweykowska-Kulinska

Molecular relationships and biogeography of two Gondwanan Campylopus species, C. pilifer and C. introflexus (Dicranaceae) - Michael Stech and Joana Dohrmann

Also included is a foreword by Dr. Peter H. Raven of the Missouri Botanical Garden, a Preface by the editors, and a full taxonomic index.