Wednesday, May 18, 2016

A new plant: Spiradiclis pengshuiensis

Image from original publication
in Phytokeys
Ophiorrhizeae is a group in the coffee family Rubiaceae, subfamily Rubioideae. It contains about 360 species in 4 genera only found in tropical and subtropical Asia and the Pacific region. Some species of the group contain camptothecin, an alkaloid used to make chemotherapeutic agents (cancer chemotherapy).

Today's species was found in the Pengshui County, China already in 2013. However, at that time there wasn't enough material for a thorough morphological observation and comparison. Therefore, researchers went back in the following years and successively collected the vouchers during the flowering and fruiting seasons. 

For the experts: Spiradiclis pengshuiensis Bo Pan & R. J. Wang (Rubiaceae) is described as a new species from Chongqing in SW China. It is morphologically compared with S. pauciflora L. Wu & Q. R. Liu because of their similarities in habit, pubescent surface, small leaf laminas and subglobose capsules. Its conservation status is evaluated as “VU” according to the IUCN categories and criteria.

2 comments:

  1. Dirk, why not add the original source information for this otherwise very useful site & information? CC-BY somehow regulates that.

    Great job, keep up on!

    Lyubo / Pensoft

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  2. I always (here as well) link to the original publication. I could add a disclaimer that my 'For the expert" segment is always the abstract of the paper if this is what you are referring to. I added a caption to the image.

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