Acknowledgments:

The author wishes to show special thanks to Professor H. Ohba (University of Tokyo) and Professor M. Kato (University of Tokyo) for having given him the opportunities of botanical expedition in foreign countries, and for having trained him for the skills required for field research. The present studies were carried out with great helps of the following colleagues: Dr. Jun Yokoyama (Tohoku University), Dr. Tatsuya Fukuda (Tohoku University), and Dr. Naoko Ishikawa (National Institute for Basic Biology) for molecular phyllogenetic studies, and of Professor Hiroshi Okada (Osaka City University), Professor Ryoko Imaichi (Japan Womens' University), Professor Masahiro Kato (University of Tokyo), Professor Hideaki Ohba (University of Tokyo), Dr. Dedy Daernadi (Indonesian Institute of Sciences), Dr. Shuichi Noshiro (Forestry & Forest Products Research Institute), Dr. Hidetoshi Nagamasu (Kyoto University), Dr. Hiroshi Ikeda (Okayama University of Science) and Dr. Jun Yokoyama (Tohoku University) in the field studies mentioned in the text. Ms. Makiko Kondo, Eriko Takabe and Kazuko Kabeya in National Insitute for Basic Biology have helped the work in my laboratory. Large-scaled collection of DNA samples on FTA Cards was carried out by Dr. Yu Iokawa (Joetsu University of Education), Mr. Muneake Kanno (Tohoku University), and members of the Society of Himalayan Botany, Japan. The author also thanks Professor David Boufford (Harvard University) for his critical reading of the manuscript. This study was supported by a grant from the SOKENDAI group research project from the Graduate University for Advanced Studies, and a Grant-in-Aid from the Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture, Japan.