Botany 241 tropical plant systematics fall 2014 Instructor

Zomlefer, W.B. 1994. Guide to Flowering-Plant Families. Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press.

Judd, W.S., C.S. Campbell, E.A. Kellogg, P.F. Stevens, and M.J. Donoghue. 2007. Plant systematics: a phylogenetic approach. 3^rd edition. Sunderland, Massachisetts: Sinauer Press.

Mabberley, D.J. 1997. The Plant-Book. Cambridge, England. 2nd. ed. Cambridge Univ.

Press.
Course Abstract: This is the most exciting time in the history of plant systematics and evolution. Modern analytic tools (inferring phylogeny using cladistic methods) combined with DNA sequence characters have revolutionized the science. At the same time, the lure of the deep forests of the tropics remains irresistible, at least to some of us. My goals are three:

1. 
   to acquaint you with the diversity and biology of key tropical flowering-plant families
   
2. 
   give you substantial insight into the morphological diversity and evolution of flowering plants
   
3. 
   provide an introduction into the rich terrain of flowering-plant biogeography, pollination and dispersal ecology, and chemical and mechanical defenses
   
4. 
   touch on the ethnobotany of the plants as time permits
   

To teach the spot characters for the Gentry families.

To illustrate plant biology using the Gentry families.

To provide a working knowledge of current angiosperm phylogeny and its history.

To demonstrate current research through readings in the recent literature.
Things you need to know that I will end up reviewing or teaching in detail:
How phylogenetic inference works.

Basic biogeography.

Basic structure of flowering plants with knowledge of terminology.

Basic molecular biology.

Evaluation: Evaluation of your work in this course is self-designed to a certain extent. There will be a midterm and a final. A separate research project is welcome; I will give more thoughts on this. By the time of the midterm you need to decide on how you want to be graded - that is what each of your course components will be worth.

In 1988, the legendary Al Gentry listed the most common families of plants in three forests in tropical America (Annals Missouri Botanical Garden 75:1-34.). Here are his lists (order is from most to least important in each forest type:

low (hot), moist and wet low (hot), dry mid-elevation (cool), wet
(0-1000m, 0.5+m rain) (0-1000m, < 0.5m rain) (1000-2000m, >1m rain)

legumes legumes Lauraceae

Annonaceae Bignoniaceae Rubiaceae

Moraceae Rubiaceae Melastomataceae

Bignoniaceae Sapindaceae Euphorbiaceae

Lauraceae Capparaceae Moraceae

Rubiaceae Flacourtiaceae Guttiferae

Sapotaceae Euphorbiaceae legumes

Palmae Nyctaginaceae ferns

Euphorbiaceae Boraginaceae Araceae

Myristicaceae Cactaceae Palmae

Meliaceae Malpighiaceae

Sapindaceae

Considering these lists and the plants I find most prominently in the American tropics and including a couple of groups out of enthusiasm yields an arbitrary list of the 27 most important families in the American tropics. The families, in the APG classification order, consistute the order of discussion for this course.

ALPHABETICAL ORDER APG CLASSIFICATION ORDER

27. Bignoniaceae
THE CURRENT APG TREE OF ANGIOSPERM ORDERS, FROM THE APG WEBSITE


http://www.mobot.org/MOBOT/research/APWeb/welcome.html TREES

CRITICAL CHARACTERS
Botany 241, Tropical Plant Systematics
This is a list of characters that are likely to be useful in identifying plant families in the tropics, in situations where you have fresh material and a hand lens. I have purposely chosen the characters that also relate to the discussions of the phylogeny of angiosperm families as a whole, so that as you look for characters you can start to think about relationships. There are many more characters, many of which we will mention; these are just the common ones.
27 CRITICAL CHARACTERS FOR LEARNING

FAMILIES OF FLOWERING PLANTS