Hypericaceae

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Hypericaceae
Hypericum quadrangulum0.jpg
Hypericum tetrapterum
Scientific classification Red Pencil Icon.png
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Rosids
Order: Malpighiales
Family: Hypericaceae
Juss. [1]
Genera

See text

Hypericaceae is a plant family in the order Malpighiales, comprising six to nine genera and up to 700 species, and commonly known as the St. John's wort family. Members are found throughout the world apart from extremely cold or dry habitats. Hypericum and Triadenum occur in temperate regions but other genera are mostly tropical.

Contents

Characteristics

Members of this family are annual or perennial herbs, subshrubs or shrubs. The leaves are simple and entire, in opposite pairs; they are sometimes dotted with black or translucent glandular spots. The inflorescence consists of a branched, flat-topped cluster, each flower being radially symmetrical, with a superior ovary. Flowers have the following components: sepals, four or five, which tend to persist; petals four or five, usually yellow, sometimes dotted with black specks; stamens many, on long filaments; styles, three to five, often fused at the base. The fruit has a dehiscent capsule which splits open when ripe to release the fine black seed. [2]

Taxonomy

At one time, this family was accepted as a subfamily of the family Clusiaceae. Now it has been elevated to full family status. In Phytotaxa , six genera and around 590 species are listed, [3] whereas The Plant List recognises nine genera and around 700 species. Members of the family are found worldwide except in excessively cold or dry areas. Most of the genera are mainly tropical, but Hypericum and Triadenum are found in temperate regions. [4] Molecular data supports the monophyly of Hypericaceae. [5]

When accepted as a complete family, the cladogram of Hypericaceae would appear as such:

Hypericaceae
Cratoxyleae

Cratoxylum

Eliea

Triadenum

Hypericeae

Hypericum

Thornea

Lianthus

Vismieae

Harungana

Psorospermum

Vismia

Pharmacology

Common St. John's wort Saint John's wort flowers.jpg
Common St. John's wort

Many members of this family contain the naphthodianthrone derivatives hypericin and pseudohypericin; these are contained in glandular tissues that appear as black, orange or translucent spots or lines on petals, leaves and other parts of the plant. These compounds are photosensitive and can cause reactions in grazing animals, such as blistering of the muzzle, as well as in people who come into contact with the plants over prolonged periods. [4] The highest concentration of these substances occurs in common St. John's wort (Hypericum perforatum), which is used in herbalism and as a folk remedy. [6]

Related Research Articles

Smilacaceae Family of flowering plants

Smilacaceae, the greenbriers, is a family of flowering plants. While they were often assigned to a more broadly defined family Liliaceae, most recent botanists have accepted the two as distinct families, diverging around 55 million years ago during the Early Paleogene. One characteristic that distinguishes Smilacaceae from most of the other members of the Liliaceae-like Liliales is that it has true vessels in its conducting tissue. Another is that the veins of the leaves, between major veins, are reticulate (net-shaped), rather than parallel as in most monocots.

Clusiaceae Family of mainly tropical flowering plants

The Clusiaceae or GuttiferaeJuss. (1789) are a family of plants including 13 genera and ca 750 species. Several former members of Clusiacae are now placed in Calophyllaceae and Hypericaceae. They are mostly trees and shrubs, with milky sap and fruits or capsules for seeds. The family is primarily tropical. More so than many plant families, it shows large variation in plant morphology. According to the APG III, this family belongs to the order Malpighiales.

Violaceae Family of flowering plants in the eudicot order Malpighiales, including violets and pansies

Violaceae is a family of flowering plants established in 1802, consisting of about 1000 species in about 25 genera. It takes its name from the genus Viola, the violets and pansies.

<i>Hypericum</i> Genus of flowering plants known as St. Johns worts

Hypericum is a genus of flowering plants in the family Hypericaceae. The genus has a nearly worldwide distribution, missing only from tropical lowlands, deserts and polar regions. Many Hypericum species are regarded as invasive species and noxious weeds. All members of the genus may be referred to as St. John's wort, and some are known as goatweed. The white or pink flowered marsh St. John's worts of North American and eastern Asia are generally accepted as belonging to the separate genus Triadenum.

Elaeocarpaceae Family of flowering plants

Elaeaocarpaceae is a family of flowering plants. The family contains approximately 615 species of trees and shrubs in 12 genera. The largest genera are Elaeocarpus, with about 350 species, and Sloanea, with about 120.

Podostemaceae Family of aquatic plants

Podostemaceae, a family in the order Malpighiales, comprise about 50 genera and ca 300 species of more or less thalloid aquatic herbs. Riverweeds adhere to hard surfaces in rapids and waterfalls of rivers. They are found mostly in tropical and subtropical areas worldwide. Many species are found in a very small geographic area, often even just a single river or waterfall. Because of their small range, many species are seriously threatened, especially from habitat loss. Riverweeds are submerged when water levels are high, but during the dry season they live a terrestrial existence, flowering at this time. Their root anatomy is specialized for the purpose of clinging to rocks, and in fact details of the root structure are one of the ways of classifying riverweeds.

<i>Hypericum tetrapterum</i> Species of flowering plants in the St Johns wort family Hupericaceae

Hypericum tetrapterum is a herbaceous perennial plant species in the flowering plant family Hypericaceae. Its common names include St. Peter's wort, Peterwort, square stemmed St. John's wort, and square stalked St. John's wort.

Malpighiaceae Family of flowering plants

Malpighiaceae is a family of flowering plants in the order Malpighiales. It comprises about 73 genera and 1315 species, all of which are native to the tropics and subtropics. About 80% of the genera and 90% of the species occur in the New World and the rest in the Old World.

Elatinaceae Family of flowering plants

Elatinaceae is a family of flowering plants with ca 35 species in two genera: Elatine and Bergia. The Elatine are mostly aquatic herbs, and the Bergia are subshrubs to shrubs. Elatine species are widely distributed throughout the world from temperate to tropical zones, with its greatest diversity found in temperate zones. Bergia is found in temperate to tropical Eurasia and Africa, with two tropical and one tropical to temperate species in the Americas. The center for biodiversity of Bergia is the Old World tropics, and this is also the center for biodiversity for the family. Neither genus is found in arctic ecosystems.

Peridiscaceae Family of flowering plants in the order Saxifragales

Peridiscaceae is a family of flowering plants in the order Saxifragales. Four genera comprise this family: Medusandra, Soyauxia, Peridiscus, and Whittonia., with a total of 12 known species. It has a disjunct distribution, with Peridiscus occurring in Venezuela and northern Brazil, Whittonia in Guyana, Medusandra in Cameroon, and Soyauxia in tropical West Africa. Whittonia is possibly extinct, being known from only one specimen collected below Kaieteur Falls in Guyana. In 2006, archeologists attempted to rediscover it, however, it proved unsuccessful.

Schoepfiaceae Family of flowering plants

Schoepfiaceae is a family of flowering plants recognized in the APG III system of 2009. The family was previously only recognized by few taxonomists; the plants in question usually being assigned to family Olacaceae and Santalaceae.

<i>Hypericum maculatum</i> Species of flowering plant in the St Johns wort family Hypericaceae

Hypericum maculatum, commonly known as imperforate St John's-wort, or spotted St. Johnswort, is a species of perennial herbaceous flowering plant in the family Hypericaceae. It is native to Europe and Western Asia where it grows in moist meadows.

Lepidobotryaceae Family of flowering plants

Lepidobotryaceae is a flowering plant family in the order Celastrales. It contains only two genera, each with a single species: Lepidobotrys staudtii and Ruptiliocarpon caracolito.

<i>Hypericum humifusum</i> Species of flowering plant in the St Johns wort family Hypericaceae

Hypericum humifusum is a prostrate flowering plant in the St. John's wort family Hypericaceae commonly known as trailing St John's-wort. It is found in Western Europe.

<i>Hypericum hirsutum</i> Species of flowering plant in the St Johns wort family Hypericaceae

Hypericum hirsutum is a species of flowering plant in the family Hypericaceae, commonly known as hairy St John's-wort. It is found in Western Europe.

Peraceae Family of flowering plants

Peraceae Klotzsch is a family of flowering plants in the eudicot order Malpighiales. The family was segregated from the Euphorbiaceae by Johann Friedrich Klotzsch in 1859, and its uniqueness was affirmed by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's Euphorbiaceae expert, Airy Shaw.

Hypericum fraseri Species of flowering plant in the St Johns wort family Hypericaceae

Triadenum fraseri known as bog St. John's wort, Fraser's St. John's wort, and Fraser's marsh St. John's wort, is a perennial flowering plant in the family Hypericaceae that is grows in wetlands of the northeastern and northcentral United States and lower Canada. It is named after John Fraser (1750–1811), a Scottish botanist and widely travelled plant collector.

<i>Hypericum sampsonii</i> Species of flowering plant in the St Johns wort family Hypericaceae

Hypericum sampsonii is a species of flowering plant in the St. John's wort family, Hypericaceae. It occurs in China, Taiwan, Japan, Myanmar, and Vietnam. It is one of two species of Hypericum in the section Hypericum sect. Sampsonia.

<i>Hypericum virginicum</i> Species of flowering plant in the St Johns wort family Hypericaceae

Hypericum virginicum, the marsh St. Johns-wort or Virginia marsh St. Johnswort, is a species of flowering plant in the family Hypericaceae. It is native to the central and eastern United States and eastern Canada.

References

  1. Angiosperm Phylogeny Group (2009). "An update of the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group classification for the orders and families of flowering plants: APG III" (PDF). Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society. 161 (2): 105–121. doi: 10.1111/j.1095-8339.2009.00996.x . Retrieved 8 October 2021.
  2. "Hypericaceae (St. John's-wort) family". Go Botany. New England Wildflower Society. Retrieved 17 June 2018.
  3. Christenhusz, M. J. M.; Byng, J. W. (2016). "The number of known plants species in the world and its annual increase". Phytotaxa. 261 (3): 201–217. doi: 10.11646/phytotaxa.261.3.1 .
  4. 1 2 Robson, Norman K.B. "Hypericaceae Jussieu: St John's Wort Family". Flora of North America. Retrieved 17 June 2018.
  5. Kenneth J. Wurdack; Charles C. Davis (2009), "Malpighiales phylogenetics: Gaining ground on one of the most recalcitrant clades in the angiosperm tree of life", American Journal of Botany, 96 (8): 1551–1570, doi:10.3732/ajb.0800207, PMID   21628300
  6. "St. John's Wort". National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, US National Institutes of Health. September 2016. Retrieved 17 June 2018.