I study plant systematics — specifically, the evolution of the Potentilla breweri complex (Rosaceae), a group of strawberry-like mountain-meadow wildflowers that casually thumbs its collective nose at the concept of species boundaries. It’s a complex case study in network phylogeny, introgressive hybridization, and sky-island biogeography.

The plants are found in scattered high-montane to subalpine meadows in the Sierra Nevada, the Cascades, and the isolated mountain ranges of the Great Basin, with one species (P. drummondii) ranging as far north as Alaska. I’ve collected them from all over their United States range.

Using genome skimming (next-generation sequencing), I have built a bifurcating phylogeny and am working to build phylogenetic networks, in order to reconstruct the plants’ history of hybridization and introgression. Onto those phylogenies I am mapping information about their cytology (DNA content values), morphology (morphometrics of both wild-collected and common-garden phenotypes), ecology (niche modeling), and biogeography (ancestral area reconstruction, paleoclimate niche modeling).

Potentilla publications

• DiNicola, A.C. “Evolution of the Potentilla breweri complex: hybridization and radiation in the Great Basin sky islands.” PhD dissertation, The University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2025. ISBN 9798293816507.
• Ertter, B. & A.C. DiNicola (2025). Potentilla bruceae (Rosaceae): a case study in taxonomic species as repeatedly modified hypotheses, with an updated treatment for the current circumscription. Phytoneuron 2025-06: 1-13.
• DiNicola, A.C. & B. Ertter (2024). Something old is something new: resurrection of a subalpine Potentilla (Rosaceae) from the Trinity Alps of California. Madroño 70(4): 232-241. DOI: 10.3120/0024-9637-70.4.232
• DiNicola, A.C., K. Sytsma, & B. Ertter (2024, June). Reading between, across, and under the lines: phylogenetic interpretation of a group that resists straightforward interpretation. Lecture conducted at the annual meeting of the Botanical Society of America et al. (BOTANY 2024), Grand Rapids, MI.
• DiNicola, A.C., K. Sytsma, & B. Ertter (2020, January). Something old and something new in the Trinity Alps: an expedition, a resurrection, and Potentilla millefolia var. algida. Lecture conducted at the Northern California Botanists’ 2020 Symposium, Chico, CA.
• DiNicola, A.C., B. Ertter, & K. Sytsma (2019, July). Evolution of the Potentilla breweri complex: hybridization and radiation in the Great Basin sky islands. Lecture conducted at the annual meeting of the Botanical Society of America et al. (BOTANY 2019), Tucson, AZ.
• DiNicola, A.C., B. Ertter, & K. Sytsma (2018, July). Hybrid surprises in the Potentilla breweri complex. Lightning talk conducted at the annual meeting of the Botanical Society of America et al. (BOTANY 2018), Rochester, MN.
• DiNicola, A.C., B. Ertter, & K. Sytsma (2018, February). Evolution of the Potentilla breweri complex: adaptation, hybridization, and radiation in the Great Basin sky islands. Lecture conducted at the Conservation Conference of the California Native Plant Society, Los Angeles, CA.
• Ertter, B. & A.C. DiNicola (2017). Overview of Potentilla versicolor (Rosaceae) and a new variety in the “sky islands” of central and eastern Oregon. Phytoneuron 2017-65: 1-8.

Other publications

• Spalink, D., N. Karimi, J.H. Richards, E. Eifler, A. DiNicola, T. Thein, L. Schomaker, B.T. Drew, K. McCulloh, T.J. Givnish (2022). Short-distance gene flow and morphological divergence in Eschscholzia parishii (Papaveraceae): implications for speciation in desert winter annuals. Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society 200(2): 255-269. DOI: 10.1093/botlinnean/boac010
• Rose, J.P., R. Kriebel, L. Kahan, A. DiNicola. J.G. González-Gallegos, F. Celep, E.M. Lemmon, A.R. Lemmon, K.J. Sytsma, & B.T. Drew (2021). Sage insights into the phylogeny of Salvia: dealing with sources of discordance within and across genomes. Frontiers in Plant Science 12: 2606.