I’m a postdoctoral fellow in Plant Evolution & Biodiversity Group leading by Dr. Wolf L. Eiserhardt at Aarhus University in Denmark.
Former Soltis Lab member. Once gator, always gator!
I have a keen passion for applying phylogenetic tree as a pivotal framework attempting to solve fundamental issues in biology. Phylogenetic tree is a crucial reference system for biological research. It captures evolutionary relationships among species, linking all the biological data together with an evolutionary context, serving as the biological “Periodic Table”.
My research interests are:
Building and using large-scale phylogenetic trees to explore the evolutionary and/or ecological patterns with spatial and/or paleoclimate data. E.g., some works have done for rosids and PhyloSynth.
Investigating the phylogenetic incongruence among data partitions, and deciphering its potential evolutionary cause
Studying taxonomy, phylogeny, biogeography, origin and dispersal for a focal clade (e.g., Elaeagnus)
When NOT struggling for existence, I occasionally do some coding!!
PhD in Botany, 2014
Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences
MS in Botany, 2009
Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences
BS in Environmental Science, 2006
Beijing Forestry University
PhyloSynth is a collaborative group of scientists that aim to provide an updated framework and set of phylogenies for the plant tree of life.
Biodiversity is multidimensional, composed of genetic, phenotypic, ecological, and geographic variation within and among species. The forests of eastern Asia and eastern North America were anciently connected, offering an excellent opportunity to study the drivers of its biodiversity. This is a US-China collaboration project. See Project Homepage
Tree of Life — Evolutionary relastionship matters!! See TreeTender, Doug Slotis @TedxUF talk, and The Great Tree of Life by Solti (2019).
Rosids, among the largest clades of angiosperms (90,000–120,000 species, ca. 25% of all angiosperms), exhibit tremendous overall diversity in morphology, chemistry, habit, reproductive strategy, and life history. However, our knowledge of this clade is remarkably limited along any sampling metric, hampering efforts to better understand its incredible species diversity.
I am Certified Instructor of The Carpentries (a non-profit organization, aiming to teach foundational coding and data science skills to researchers worldwide). I’m aslo an ex-board member of UF Carpentries Club. Here are some workshop stats that summerize the numbers of workshops we organized and the numbers of people that we trained.
Lecture titled as ‘Building, Using, and Tending The Tree of Life’ on Friday, Oct 23, 2020
Plant Evolution and Biodiversity (PEB) Group
Department of Biology – Ecoinformatics and Biodiversity, Aarhus University
Ny Munkegade 116, Building 1535, Room 227, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark
Email: cactusresponsible@gmail.com; miaosun@bio.au.dk
Homepage: https://www.sunmiao.name
Twitter: \@Miao_the_Sun
2002 ~ 2006, Bachelor of Environmental Science, College of Resources and Environment, Beijing Forestry University
2012.10 ~ 2013.1, Visiting scholar in Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida
2020.2 ~ 2020.8, Visiting scholar in Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Michigan
Postdoctoral Research Fellow (2019.10 ~ present)
Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University
Advisor: Dr. Wolf L. Eiserhardt
Postdoctoral Research Fellow (2016 ~ 2019.8)
Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida
Advisor: Dr. Pamela S. Soltis
Postdoctoral Research Fellow (2015 ~ 2016)
Department of Biology, University of Florida
Advisor: Dr. Douglas E. Soltis
Research Assistant (2014.07 ~ 2015.01)
State Key Laboratory of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany
Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Advisor: Dr. Zhiduan Chen
A phylogenetic tree is a pivotal framework for solving fundamental issues in biology. My long-term research goal is to use a robust phylogeny to elucidate patterns of evolutionary radiations in angiosperms and to address the causes of plant diversification using the tools of comparative biology.
Taxonomic skills:
Molecular biology skills:
Bioinformatical skills:
Language skills:
Fluent spoken and written Chinese and English
*equally contributing author; 27 publications, h-index 11; 574 total citations according to Google Scholar
Lin H-Y*, Sun M*, et al. (In prep.) Community assembly processes and diversification rate contribute to the phylogenetic diversity anomaly between eastern Asia and eastern North America.
Sun M, Folk FA, Gitzendanner MA, Smith SA, Germain-Aubrey C, Guralnick RP, Soltis PS, Chen ZD, Soltis DE. Exploring the phylogeny and diversification of rosids with a five-locus supermatrix. bioRxiv 694950. doi: 10.1101⁄694950.
Lu LM, Hu HH, Peng DX, Liu B, Ye JF, Yang T, Li HL, Sun M, Smith SA, Soltis PS, Soltis DE, Chen ZD. (2020). Noise does not equal bias in assessing the evolutionary history of the angiosperm flora of China: A response to Qian. Journal of Biogeography 47: 2286–2291. doi: 10.1111/jbi.13947.
Sun M*, Folk FA*, Gitzendanner MA, Soltis PS, Chen ZD, Soltis DE, Guralnick RP. (2020). Recent, accelerated diversification in rosids occurred outside the tropics. Nature Communications 11: 3333. doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-17116-5.
Sun M*, Folk FA*, Gitzendanner MA, Soltis PS, Chen ZD, Soltis DE, Guralnick RP. (2020). Estimating rates and patterns of diversification with incomplete sampling: A case study in the rosids. American Journal of Botany 107(6): 1–15. doi: 10.1002/ajb2.1479 (also see bioRxiv 749325).
Lichman BR, Godden GT, Hamilton JP, Lira Palmer L, Kamileen MO, Zhao D, Vaillancourt B, Wood J, Sun M, Henry LK, Lopez CR, Dudareva N, Soltis DE, Soltis PS, Buell CR, O’Connor SE. (2020). The evolutionary origins of the cat attractant nepetalactone in catnip. Science Advances 6: eaba0721. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aba0721.
Mu XY, Tong L, Sun M, Zhu YX, Wen J, Lin QW, Liu B. (2020). Phylogeny and divergence time estimation of the walnut family (Juglandaceae) based on nuclear RAD-Seq and chloroplast genome data. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 147: 106802. doi: 10.1016/j.ympev.2020.106802.
Xue B, Guo X, Landis JB, Sun M, Tang CC, Soltis PS, Soltis DE, R.M.K. Saunders RMK. (2019). Accelerated diversification correlated with functional traits shapes extant diversity of the early divergent angiosperm family Annonaceae. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 142: 106659. doi: 10.1016/j.ympev.2019.106659.
Li DJ, Lauren Trotta L, Marx HE, Allen JM, Sun M, Soltis DE, Soltis PS, Guralnick RP, Baiser BH. (2019). For comparing phylogenetic diversity among communities, go ahead and use synthesis phylogenies. Ecology. doi: 10.1002/ecy.2788.
Yang T, Tedersoo L, Soltis PS, Soltis DE, Gilbert JA, Sun M, Shi Y, Wang HF, Li YT, Zhang J, Chen ZD, Lin HY, Zhao YP, Fu CX, Chu HY. (2018). Phylogenetic imprint of woody plants on the soil mycobiome in natural mountain forests of eastern China. The ISME Journal 13: 686–697.
Marodiev EV, Sun M, Schroder L, Steadman DW, Ebach MC. (2018). Moving from modern toward post-modern science: comment on “An integrated assessment of the vascular plants of the Americas.” Phytotaxa 351: 96–98.
Folk RA, Sun M, Soltis PS, Smith SA, Soltis DE, and Robert P. Guralnick. (2018). Challenges of comprehensive taxon sampling in comparative biology: Wrestling with Rosids. American Journal of Botany 105(3): 433–445.
Lu LM*, Mao L*, Yang T*, Ye JF*, Liu B*, Li HL*, Sun M*, Miller JT, Mathews S, Hu HH, Niu YT, Peng DX, Chen YH, Smith SA, Chen M, Xiang KL, Le CT, Dang VC, Lu AM, Soltis PS, Soltis DE, Li JH, Chen ZD. (2018). Evolutionary history of the angiosperm flora of China. Nature 554: 234–238. doi: 10.1038/nature25485.
Mu XY, Sun M, Yang PF, Lin QW. (2017). Unveiling the identity of Wenwan walnuts and phylogenetic relationships of Asian Juglans species using restriction site-associated DNA-sequencing. Frontiers in Plant Science (8): 1708. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2017.01708
Hodel RG, Gitzendanner MA, Germain-Aubrey CC, Liu X, Crowl AA, Sun M, Landis JB, Segovia-Salcedo MC, Douglas NA, Chen SC, Soltis DE, Soltis PS. (2016). A new resource for the development of SSR markers: Millions of loci from a thousand plant transcriptomes. Applications in Plant Sciences 4(6): 1600024.
Hodel RG, Segovia-Salcedo MC, Landis JB, Crowl AA, Sun M, Liu XX, Gitzendanner MA, Douglas NA, Germain-Aubrey CC, Chen SC, Soltis DE, Soltis PS. (2016). The report of my death was an exaggeration: A review for researchers using microsatellites in the 21st century. Applications in Plant Sciences 4(6): 1600025.
Chen ZD, Yang T, Li Lin, Lu LM, Li HL, Sun M, Liu B, Chen M, Niu YT, Ye JF, Cao ZY, Liu HM, Wang XM, Wang W, Zhang JB, Meng Z, Cao W, Li JH, Wu SD, Zhao HL, Liu ZJ, Du ZY, Wang QF, Guo J, Tan XX, Su JX, Zhang LJ, Yang LL, Liao YY, Li MH, Zhang GQ, Chung SW, Zhang J, Xiang KL, Li RQ, Soltis DE, Soltis PS, Zhou SL, Ran JH, Wang XQ, Jin XH, Chen YS, Gao TG, Li JH, Zhang SZ, Lu AM. (2016). Tree of life for the genera of Chinese vascular plants. Journal of Systematics and Evolution 54(4): 227-306.
Li HL, Wang W, Li RQ, Zhang JB, Sun M, Naeem R, Su JX, Xiang XG, Mortimer PE, Li DZ, Hyde KD, Xu JC, Soltis DE, Soltis PS, Li JH, Zhang SZ, Wu H, Chen ZD, Lu AM. (2016). Global versus Chinese perspectives on the phylogeny of the N-fixing clade. Journal of Systematics and Evolution 54(4): 392-399.
Sun M, Naeem R, Su JX, Burleigh GJ, Solits DE, Soltis PS, Chen ZD. (2016). Phylogeny of the Rosidae: A dense taxon sampling analysis. Journal of Systematics and Evolution 54(4): 363-391.
Sun M, Solits DE, Soltis PS, Zhu XY, Burleigh GJ, Chen ZD. (2015). Deep phylogenetic incongruence in the angiosperm clade Rosidae. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 83: 156-166.
Wang B, Zhang Y, Wei P, Sun M, Ma X, Zhu X. (2015). Identification of nuclear low-copy genes and their phylogenetic utility in rosids. Genome 57(10): 150203143525007.
Lu LM, Sun M, Zhang JB, Li HL, Lin L, Yang T, Chen M, Chen ZD. (2014). Tree of life and its applications. Biodiversity Science 22: 3-20.
Sun M, Lin Q. (2010). A revision of Elaeagnus L. (Elaeagnaceae) in mainland China. Journal of Systematics and Evolution 48(5): 356-390.
Sun M, Lin Q, Sun Q, Bei SQ, Li HL, Yang ZR. (2008). Validation of eight names of Chinese taxa in Ranunculaceae, Rosaceae and Scrophulariaceae. Kew Bulletin 64: 573-575.
Sun M, Lin Q. (2008). Lectotypification of five scientific names in Rosaceae. Guihaia 28: 295-297. (In Chinese)
Lin Q, Bei SQ, Li HL, Cao ZY, Sun Q, Sun M, Yang ZR. (2008). Lectotypification of twenty names of Chinese taxa in Angiospermae. Bulletin of Botanical Research 5: 534-539.
Lin Q, Sun Q, Sun M, Bei SQ, Li HL. (2007). Lectotypification of twenty-eight names of Chinese taxa in Angiospermae. Acta Botanica Boreali-occidentalia Sinica, 27: 1247-1255.
2018
2017
2016
2015
2020
2019
2018
2017
2016
2015 ~ 2010
Pamela S. Soltis (Postdoc advisor)
Florida Museum of Natural History
University of Florida
Gainesville, FL 32611, USA
Email: psoltis@flmnh.ufl.edu
Phone: +1 (352) 273-1964
Douglas E. Soltis (Postdoc advisor)
Department of Biology
University of Florida
Gainesville, FL 32611, USA
Email: dsoltis@ufl.edu
Phone: +1 (352) 273-1963
Wolf Eiserhardt (Postdoc advisor)
Department of Bioscience
Ny Munkegade 116
building 1535, 225
8000 Aarhus C, Denmark
Email: wolf.eiserhardt@bios.au.dk
Phone: +45 87156136
Stephen A. Smith (Collaborator)
Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
Email: eebsmith@umich.edu
Phone: +1 (734) 764-7923
Zhiduan Chen (PhD advisor)
State Key Laboratory of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany
Institute of Botany
Chinese Academy of Sciences
Email: zhiduan@ibcas.ac.cn
Phone: +86 010-62836434
Last update: 2020-11-20