The genus Liriodendron belongs to the family Magnoliaceae, which resides within the magnoliids, an early diverging lineage of the Mesangiospermae. However, the phylogenetic relationship of magnoliids with eudicots and monocots has not been conclusively resolved and thus remains to be determined^1–6. Liriodendron is a relict lineage from the Tertiary with two distinct species—one East Asian (L. chinense (Hemsley) Sargent) and one eastern North American (L. tulipifera Linn)—identified as a vicariad species pair. However, the genetic divergence and evolutionary trajectories of these species remain to be elucidated at the whole-genome level⁷. Here, we report the first de novo genome assembly of a plant in the Magnoliaceae, L. chinense. Phylogenetic analyses suggest that magnoliids are sister to the clade consisting of eudicots and monocots, with rapid diversification occurring in the common ancestor of these three lineages. Analyses of population genetic structure indicate that L. chinense has diverged into two lineages—the eastern and western groups—in China. While L. tulipifera in North America is genetically positioned between the two L. chinense groups, it is closer to the eastern group. This result is consistent with phenotypic observations that suggest that the eastern and western groups of China may have diverged long ago, possibly before the intercontinental differentiation between L. chinense and L. tulipifera. Genetic diversity analyses show that L. chinense has tenfold higher genetic diversity than L. tulipifera, suggesting that the complicated regions comprising east–west-orientated mountains and the Yangtze river basin (especially near 30° N latitude) in East Asia offered more successful refugia than the south–north-orientated mountain valleys in eastern North America during the Quaternary glacial period.

Background: The origin and importance of exon-intron architecture comprises one of the remaining mysteries of gene evolution. Several studies have investigated the variations of intron length, GC content, ordinal position in a gene and divergence. However, there is little study about the structural variation of exons and introns.Results: We investigated the length, GC content, ordinal position and divergence in both exons and introns of 13 eukaryotic genomes, representing plant and animal. Our analyses revealed that three basic patterns of exon-intron variation were present in nearly all analyzed genomes (P< 0.001 in most cases): an ordinal reduction of length and divergence in both exon and intron, a co-variation between exon and its flanking introns in their length, GC content and divergence, and a decrease of average exon (or intron) length, GC content and divergence as the total exon numbers of a gene increased. In addition, we observed that the shorter introns had either low or high GC content, and the GC content of long introns was intermediate.Conclusion: Although the factors contributing to these patterns have not been identified, our results provide three important clues: common factor(s) exist and may shape both exons and introns; the ordinal reduction patterns may reflect a time-orderly evolution; and the larger first and last exons may be splicing-required. These clues provide a framework for elucidating mechanisms involved in the organization of eukaryotic genomes and particularly in building exon-intron structures.