Clematis tomentella 2001 (Ranunculaceae) is a typical drought-tolerant sand-fixing plant in desert ecosystem in northwest China. To elucidate the phylogenetic status of C. tomentella and its related species, we determined the complete chloroplast (cp) genome and analyzed their interspecific relationships. The result showed that the cp genome of C. tomentella was 159 816 bp in length, including two inverted repeats of 31 045 bp, a large single copy region of 79 535 bp, and a small single copy region of 18 191 bp. 136 genes were annotated across the whole cp genome, including 92 protein-coding genes, 8 rRNA genes, and 36 tRNA genes, as well as the GC content accounted for 38%. Crucially, we found that the regions of psbE-petL, trnG_UCC-atpA, ndhF-rpl32, and rps8-infA were highly divergent, which could be marked as DNA barcodes for the identification of C. tomentella in Ranunculaceae. A maximum likelihood phylogenetic tree revealed that C. tomentella was closely related to C. fruticosa. Our results provide the references and implications for the phylogenetic study of Clematis in Ranunculaceae in the future.

Clematis tomentella 2001（毛茛科）是我国西北荒漠生态系统中典型的耐旱固沙植物。为了阐明C. tomentella及其相关物种的系统发育状况，我们确定了完整的叶绿体 (cp) 基因组并分析了它们的种间关系。结果表明，毛毛蠹的cp基因组长度为159 816 bp，包括两个31 045 bp的反向重复序列、一个79 535 bp的大单拷贝区域和一个18 191 bp的小单拷贝区域。全基因组注释了136个基因，其中蛋白编码基因92个，rRNA基因8个，tRNA基因36个，GC含量占38%。至关重要的是，我们发现psbE-petL、 t rnG_UCC-atpA、ndhF-rpl32和rps8-infA的区域高度分歧，可以将其标记为 DNA 条形码，用于鉴定毛茛科毛毛茛属。最大似然系统发育树显示，C. tomentella与C. fruticosa密切相关。本研究结果为今后毛茛科铁线莲的系统发育研究提供参考和启示。