Marcgraviaceae

Norantea guianensis, Inflorescences with red nectaries and inconspicuous flowers

The Marcgraviaceae are a family from the order of the heather -like ( Ericales ) within the angiosperms ( Magnoliopsida ). It contains seven genera and approximately 130 species. A few species (eg Norantea guianensis ) are used as ornamental plants.

• 5.1 Notes and references

Description

Vegetative characteristics

The types of Marcgraviaceae are woody plants: mostly lianas or shrubs and rarely small trees. In addition to many taxa terrestrial grow, there are some hemiepiphytes and epiphytes. There are adventitious roots formed in some species for attachment to documents. Young plant parts are often reddish by anthocyanins.

On the branches the leaves are arranged opposite one another and spiral or two lines. The leathery and often fleshy leaves are petiolate or sessile. Marcgravia species are often heterophyll, ie there are different leaf shapes in a way: on young plants and documents adherent branches the leaves are often sitting and arranged in two rows, in non -rooting branches they are stalked and arranged spirally. The hairless leaf blade is always simple, usually with indistinct veins and small, appearing as dark spots cavities (glands ) in the area of ​​the leaf blade, so that it looks cut. The stomata are staurocytisch. Stipules are not available. The youngest leaf enclosing the terminal bud.

Inflorescences, flowers and pollination

The flowers are terminal, erect or drooping often racemose, pseudo- aged men or pseudodoldigen inflorescences together. In many Marcgravia types of inflorescence forms a ring of flowers ( see illustration of Marcgravia umbellata ). The bracts ( bracts ) of the flowers are transformed can -shaped and produce nectar. In many species, two, in other species no bracteoles are present.

The hermaphrodite, radial symmetry flowers are four - or fünfzählig. Except for Marcgravia species a double perianth is present. In Marcgravia species lacking sepals, with the other five taxa durable, unequal sepals are usually available that have grown freely or at most at their base. The rare three in Marcgravia types of four or five at the most Noranteoideae petals are free or only at the base to far upwards ( Marcgravia species) be grown Roehrig. The three to 40 stamens are not together in circles and can be free or fused at the base and with the petals. There are no sterile stamens, but there are Marcgravia species with sterile flowers, which are merged with the " nectar bracts " inside the inflorescences. The small (20 to 35 microns ) pollen grains usually have three apertures, but rarely at Marcgravia, Sarcopera and Schwartzia types of four apertures before. Two to eight carpels are fused to a semi or fully above constant, syncarp nodes. Each of the two to twenty subjects ovary contains many ovules. The bloom only a stylus is available with a simple scar.

Due to the nectar- containing can -shaped bracts large pollinators are attracted. Ornithophilie is available at Marcgravia, Norantea, Sarcopera and Schwartzia brasiliensis, so they are of birds ( hummingbirds, mostly passerines ( Passeriformes ) ) pollinated. Sarcopera sessiliflora the first type of which has been described that the pollen is transferred by bird feet. Most Schwartzia species, Marcgraviastrum Marcgravia and are pollinated by bats ( Chiropterophilie ). Also by non-flying mammals as pollinators is reported. Entomophily occurs in two genera: Ruyschia are pollinated by flies or bees and Souroubea of butterflies and enthusiasts ( Sphingidae ). Some species are also autogamous and even kleistogam such as experiments at Marcgravia coriacea show.

Fruit and seeds

The durable pen -winning, lokulizidallen, almost spherical capsule fruits sometimes seem like berries. They open out from their base and contain a colored, fleshy placenta with numerous small seeds. The spherical to kidney-shaped seeds have a shiny, reticulate seed coat ( testa). The bright gefärbete Pulp, which exposed the small seed when the fruit capsules break open, suggests a endozoochore seed dispersal.

Ingredients

There are often Raphidzellen and different shaped Sklereide available. They contain anthocyanins.

Occurrence

The Marcgraviaceae family owns a purely Neotropical distribution, from northern Bolivia and southern Brazil to southern Mexico, including the West Indies. Most taxa thrive in tropical humid jungles of the lowlands, in mountain rain forests and cloud forests.

System

The family name was Marcgraviaceae of Antoine- Laurent de Jussieu in Augustin- de Candolle Pyrame on May 11, 1816: first published Essai sur les propriétés médicinales des plantes ..., 2nd edition, p 87. Often also the publications of Friedrich von Berchtold & Jan Svatopluk Presl in O Prirozenosti rostlin, 1820, p 218, or of Jacques Denis Choisy - Augustin de Candolle Pyrame: Prodromus systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis, Part 1, 1824, pp. 565 - 566 quotes. Type genus is Marcgravia L. The name is derived from the German naturalist Georg Marckgraf.

For example, by Cronquist in 1988 and Takhtajan 1997, they were placed in the Theales. The Angiosperm Phylogeny Group, most recently at APG III, it is in the order of the Ericales. The Marcgraviaceae are a sister group of the Tetrameristaceae and these two families form the Balsaminaceae together the clade of " balsaminoiden Ericales ".

The Marcgraviaceae family is divided into two subfamilies (Ward & Price 2002) and consists of eight genera with around 130 species:

• Marcgraviastrum
• Norantea
• Ruyschia
• Pseudosarcopera GIR. - Cañas: Two species, Colombia to Bolivia.
• Sarcopera
• Schwartzia
• Souroubea

Swell

The information in this article originate for the most part the limits given in evidence sources, in addition, the following sources are cited:

• The Marcgraviaceae on the APWebsite family. ( Section systematics and description)
• Stefan Dressler: Neotropical Marcgraviaceae at Neotropikey by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
• The Marcgraviaceae with five genera at DELTA by L. Watson & MJ Dallwitz family.
• Stefan Dressler: Marcgraviaceae ( Shingle Plant Family), in N. Smith, SA Mori, A. Henderson, DW Stevenson & SV Heald (eds.): Flowering Plants of the Neotropics, Princeton and Oxford, Princeton Univ. Press, 2004, pp. 236-238.
• Frederic Lens, Stefan Dressler, Stefan Vinckier, Steven Dessein, Liesbeth van Evelghem & Erik Smets: palynological variation in balsaminoid Ericales, I. Marcgraviaceae, in Annals of Botany, 96, 2005, pp. 1047-1060: PDF Online.
• Misa N. Ward & Robert A. Price: Phylogenetic relationships of Marcgraviaceae: insights from three chloroplast genes, in Systematic Botany, 27, 2002, pp. 149-160. Online. or PDF online.
• BE Hammel: Marcgraviaceae, in BE Hammel & al.: Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica, 6, 2007, pp. 374-391.