Perdicium of the Gerbera-complex (Mutisieae, Compositae) contains two species from the Western Cape of South Africa, but its phylogenetic position within the complex remains poorly understood. In this study, we assess the position of Perdicium based on a molecular phylogenetic analysis as well as leaf and pollen morphology, using a sampling scheme that includes 28 species from the Gerbera-complex. The phylogenetic results based on data from two nuclear markers (ITS and ETS) and three chloroplast regions (trnL-trnF, trnL-rpl32 and trnC-petN) suggest that Perdiciumis the sister group of a large clade of five genera that includes the African Gerbera, E Asian and N American Leibnitzia, the Eurasian Oreoseris, the American Chaptalia and the Australian Amblysperma. The clade of Perdicium Amblysperma Gerbera Leibnitzia Oreoseris Chaptalia is then sister to the largely South American clade of Trichocline, Brachyclados and Lulia. The morphological data show that Perdicium leiocarpum bears unique stomates with wax covering the guard cells on the adaxial epidermal leaf surface. Furthermore, the ratio of the polar axes and equatorial axes of the Perdicium leiocarpum pollen grains was only 1.10, which is the smallest among that of the sampled species of the Gerbera-complex. Themorphological and molecular phylogenetic data suggest an isolated position for Perdicium within the Gerbera complex, independent from Gerbera. (C) 2018 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of SAAB.
