Asteraceae, a family of flowering plants, are the most diverse group of flowering plants in the world. This plant family comprises around 34,000 species. An international research team with the participation of the University of Göttingen has now compiled and analysed a new global database on the distribution and evolutionary history of all Asteraceae species. The researchers found that an unexpectedly high number of evolutionary events – known as “speciation” where a new species of plants evolves from a common ancestor – occurred in the aster family within relatively short time periods on many islands worldwide. The results were published in Nature Communications.