Phylogeny, biogeography, and molecular dating of cornelian cherries (Cornus, Cornaceae): Tracking tertiary plant migration

Three approaches, the Bayesian, nonparametric rate smoothing, and penalized likelihood methods were employed to estimate the times of geographic isolations of species. Results of phylogenetic analyses suggest that among the six living species, Cornus sessilis from western North America represents the oldest lineage, followed by Cornus volkensii from Africa.