Eugenio Santiago-Valentin

University of Puerto Rico at Rio Piedras | UPR-RP · Department of Biology

Research conducted in the Archive and Library of Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, the U.S. National Archives, and the U.S. National Herbarium allowed us to reconstruct field work performed by David Fairchild (1869–1954) in the islands of Beata, Saona, Tobago, Tortola, and Trinidad in 1932. This was part of a larger expedition to the Caribbean Isl...

The Lathberry Clade includes seven species of Eugenia sect. Umbellatae (Myrtaceae) distributed from Puerto Rico through the Lesser Antilles. Members of the Lathberry Clade are trees and shrubs distinguished from other Antillean species by a combination of dull twigs, glabrous leaves with a raised midvein, glomerate or fasciculate inflorescences pre...

Premise of research. Ex situ plant conservation can be improved through genetic analysis. One area of interest is the relative value of conserving smaller or larger populations, and how sampling strategies for these might differ. Current practice emphasizes collecting large sample sizes from some populations and limited sampling from others, and ai...

Myrtaceae are a large family of trees and shrubs, including ca. 2500 species within the predominantly Neotropical and taxonomically problematic tribe Myrteae. Nearly 500 species of Myrteae are endemic to the Caribbean Islands Biodiversity Hotspot, but few have been represented in phylogenetic systematic studies to date. The major goals of this surv...

Plant-associated microbial communities have diverse phenotypic effects on their hosts that are only beginning to be revealed. We hypothesized that morpho-physiological variations in the tropical tree Tabebuia heterophylla, observed on different geological substrates, arise in part due to microbial processes in the rhizosphere. We characterized the...

Taxonomic treatments of Pilosocereus in the Andean and Caribbean regions have varied widely. Recent authors often recognized three species only (P. lanuginosus, P. polygonus, and P. royenii), while Britton & Rose in 1920 (sub Cephalocereus) recognized 18 species in the same region. A revision of Pilosocereus is necessary, and it was carried out by...

Las islas Canarias poseen una flora muy peculiar que ha atraído el interés de numerosos naturalistas desde el siglo XVI, pero, principalmente, a partir de finales del siglo XVII, cuando las potencias europeas comenzaron a financiar expediciones científicas alrededor del mundo. Algunas hicieron escala en el archipiélago y, a su regreso, llevaron sem...

This is an outreach article that highlights the botanical activity in the Caribbean islands by the Brothers of La Salle. It was published in The Tropical Garden, magazine of Fairchild Tropical Botanical Garden, Miami.

RESUMEN El Hermano Marie-Victorin (Conrad Kirouac, 1885–1944) fue un distinguido botánico canadiense, cuyos trabajos mejor conocidos son aquellos relacionados con las floras de Quebec y de Cuba. Sin embargo, también realizó viajes de estudio botánico en África, el Medio Oriente, Estados Unidos y Europa. Más aún, el interés de Marie-Victorin por las...

Domingo Bello y Espinosa (1817–1884) was an attorney and naturalist from the Canary Islands who lived in Mayagüez (Puerto Rico) between 1848 and 1878. He is the author of a two-part publication dated 1881 and 1883, which represents one of the first contributions on plant taxonomy made by an island resident. These studies include a total of 88 new t...

Pseudophoenix ekmanii, P. lediniana and P. vinifera (Arecaceae) are endemic to Hispaniola. The more wide-ranging P. sargentii also occurs on the island. Population genetic diversity and structure of Pseudophoenix was investigated using ten microsatellite loci. The study focused on populations from Hispaniola, but also included samples from other Ca...

Target 2 of the 2020 Global Strategy for Plant Conservation (GSPC) calls for a comprehensive list of the world's threatened plant species. The lack of such a list is one of the greatest impediments to protecting the full complement of the world's plant species, and work to achieve this has been slow. An efficient system for identifying those specie...

A review of available Caribbean Island red-lists species (CR and EN categories based on the IUCN guidelines from 2001, and E category established according to the IUCN guidelines from 1980) is presented. A database of over 1,300 endemic species that are either Critically Endangered or Endangered sensu IUCN was created. There are molecular systemati...

Ottoschulzia (Icacinaceae) includes four species of small trees found in the Antilles, Southern Mexico, and Central America. Several species in the genus have never been explicitly typified. Herein a lectotype is proposed for Ottoschulzia cubensis, and neotypes are proposed for O. domingensis, and O. rhodoxylon.

We present a morphological description of the flower and fruit of Ottoschulzia rhodoxylon based on material collected at Hacienda La Esperanza Nature Reserve, Puerto Rico, cultivated material, as well as on data in herbarium specimens. Plants of Ottoschulzia rhodoxylon bear hermaphrodite flowers, and at least some appear to be fully functional. We...

Mona Island provides an important habitat for an interesting Caribbean xeric flora, which is noted for prominent Cactaceae as well as other succulent and pachycaulous plant species. A literature review demonstrated the need for documentation of this unique xerophytic flora. Here, we detail its succulent flora, and provide photographic documentation...

Morphometric analyses are used to test two competing hypotheses of classification for Aiphanes (Arecaceae: Cocoseae) in the Antilles. Three vegetative characters and three characters of the inflorescence were analyzed via one-way analyses of variance followed by a test of pairwise comparisons for the least-squares means. We found a complex pattern...

Pollinator visits to flowers of self-incompatible tropical trees are critical for plant fecundity. However, few studies have examined how much of the variance in tropical tree fecundity is explained by individual attributes of trees (e.g. number of flowers), and how much is due to contextual variables such as distances to nearest flowering neighbou...

The Caribbean islands, despite centuries of large-scale habitat loss, still contain habitats of amazing beauty and, importantly, these habitats provide an integral foundation for the islands’ sustainable development. These surviving habitats contain unique plant diversity found nowhere else on the planet and for some families, most notably the Aste...

The impact of introduced species on native organisms is one of the main conservation concerns around the world. To fully understand the effect of introduced pollinators on native plants, it is important to know the reproductive biology of the focal species, especially its pollination biology. In this study we examined the breeding system of the end...

European scientists initiated lichenology in Puerto Rico in the 19th century. Activity of the discipline increased notably on the island during the first three decades of the 20th century, primarily by the field explorations and publications of the New York Botanical Garden scientists and associates (A. A. Heller, N. L. and E. G. Britton, L. W. Rid...

We present an overview of the conservation status of plants in the Caribbean Islands. We discuss the major accomplishments, gaps and limitations towards the 2010 Global Strategy for Plant Conservation (GSPC). A questionnaire on plant conservation nationally was distributed among the authors of this paper to be completed for their respective island(...

A phylogeny of Solanaceae is presented based on the chloroplast DNA regions ndhF and trnLF. With 89 genera and 190 species included, this represents a nearly comprehensive genus-level sampling and provides a framework phylogeny for the entire family that helps integrate many previously-published phylogenetic studies within Solanaceae. The four gene...

While the Caribbean is a recognized “biodiversity hotspot”, plant conservation has not received adequate attention; particularly, given the high levels of endemism in many plant groups. Besides establishing protected areas, there needs to be a sustained effort to study the taxonomy, systematics and ecology of the flora. Recent phylogenetic studies...

The Caribbean Island Biodiversity Hotspot is composed primarily of the Bahamas and Greater and Lesser Antilles. A total of 180 genera (727 spp., ca. 9% of the species endemic to the Antilles) are restricted to this hotspot. Most of these genera are unispecific (51%), a pattern that is also found on other islands of the world. The majority of the en...

Santiago-Valentín, E. (Herbarium, University of Puerto Rico Botanical Garden, Box 364984 San Juan 00936-4984; goetzea@yahoo.com). Amos Arthur Heller's Puerto Rico plant collecting itineraries of 1900 and 1902–1903 and their utility for the historical study of endangered plants. Brittonia 57: 292–294. 2005.—This work reports the Puerto Rico plant co...

Molecular biology techniques have had a great impact in modern studies of biodiversity across the globe, and they have contributed significantly to our understanding of evolutionary relationships across all kingdoms. Protein and DNA sequence data have provided a seemingly endless amount of characters to be used in phylogenetic studies, and they hav...

Knowledge of the evolution and biogeography of the Caribbean biota comes primarily from faunal studies, in spite of the tremendous richness of the Caribbean flora. The limited data to assess Caribbean phytogeography comes from fossils, floristic distributions, and phylogenetic studies. The geology in the Caribbean is extremely complex, but it is wi...

Coeloneurum, Espadaea, Henoonia, and Goetzea are shrubs and trees that are endemic to the islands of Cuba, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico in the Greater Antilles. A phylogenetic analysis was conducted to elucidate the evolutionary relationships among them and with other major lineages of the Solanaceae. DNA sequences of the chloroplast genes ndhF, rbc...

AMORPHOPHALLUS PAEONIIFOLIUS (DENNST.) NICOLS. (AEACEAE: LILIOPSIDA): BOTANICAL CURIOSITY IN PUERTO RICO

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 1999. "Genera in the Greater Antilles with endemic species": leaves 162-182. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 134-161).

Tables. Typescript (photocopy). Abstract in English and Spanish. Thesis (M.S.)--University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez Campus, 1995. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 92-105).