Rubiaceae is a family of flowering plants, commonly known as the coffee, madder, or bedstraw family. It consists of terrestrial trees, shrubs, lianas, or herbs that are recognizable by simple, opposite leaves with interpetiolar stipules and sympetalous actinomorphic flowers. The family contains about 14,100 species in about 580 genera, which makes it the fourth-largest angiosperm family. Rubiaceae has a cosmopolitan distribution; however, the largest species diversity is concentrated in the tropics and subtropics. Economically important genera include Coffea, the source of coffee; Cinchona, the source of the antimalarial alkaloid quinine; ornamental cultivars ; and historically some dye plants.
Genipa is a genus of trees in the family Rubiaceae. This genus is native to the American tropical forests.
Ixora is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. It is the only genus in the tribe Ixoreae. It consists of tropical evergreen trees and shrubs and holds around 544 species. Though native to the tropical and subtropical areas throughout the world, its centre of diversity is in Tropical Asia. Ixora also grows commonly in subtropical climates in the United States, such as Florida where it is commonly known as West Indian jasmine.
Canthium is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. They are shrubs and small trees. The leaves are deciduous and the stems are usually thorny.
Kraussia is a flowering plant genus in the family Rubiaceae. Apart from a species in Socotra, they are native to continental Africa. The type was described from a plant collected by Dr. F. Krauss near Durban. It is differentiated from Tricalysia and Empogona by the ovule arrangement inside the ovary cells. The genus contains between 4 and 10 species, including:
Sericanthe is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. It is found in tropical and subtropical Africa. The genus was described by Elmar Robbrecht in 1978 based on the species in Neorosea, except for the type species, Neorosea jasminiflora, which went to Tricalysia. Bacterial leaf nodules are found in most of the species and the endophytic bacteria have been identified as Burkholderia.
Vangueriopsis is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae.
Bernard Verdcourt was a biologist and taxonomist, most widely known as a botanist and latterly an honorary research fellow at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in London. Prior to coming to Kew in 1964, he was associated with the East African Herbarium for 15 years. Although his best-known work probably consists of his many studies of the East African flora, he has also made extensive contributions relating to African terrestrial mollusks and to entomology. Dr. Verdcourt received the Linnean Medal for botany from the Linnean Society of London in 2000. His list of publications includes more than 1,000 scientific works. The standard author abbreviation Verdc. is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.
Vanguerieae is a tribe of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae and contains about 655 species in 30 genera. It is one of the most species-rich groups within the family and it is distributed across the Paleotropics.
Afrocanthium is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. It consists of deciduous, unarmed trees, and shrubs. They are native to East Africa, from Sudan and Ethiopia to South Africa.
Meyna is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae.
Vangueriella is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. The genus is found in tropical Africa.
Cuviera is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae native to tropical Africa. It was originally described by Augustin Pyramus de Candolle in 1807 and is named after the French naturalist Georges Cuvier.
Globulostylis is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. It comprises 8 species growing in Central Africa.
Batopedina is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. It was described by Bernard Verdcourt in 1953. The genus is found in Burkina Faso, Ghana, D.R.Congo, and Zambia.
Empogona is a genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. The genus is found in tropical and southern Africa and Madagascar. It was for a time deemed a subgenus or section of Tricalysia.
Thomas Robert Soderstrom was an American agrostologist His special field of study was the grass family Gramineae or Poaceae. He was Curator of Grasses at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC for some twenty years.
Sabiceeae is a tribe of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae and contains about 164 species in 7 genera. Its representatives are found in tropical Africa, Madagascar, Sri Lanka, and from Mexico to tropical America. The genus Sabicea is one of the rare genera in Rubiaceae that occurs both in tropical Africa and tropical America.
Cyperus pulchellus is a sedge of the family Cyperaceae that is native to northern Australia, tropical Africa, northwest Madagascar and Southeast Asia.
Diane Mary Bridson is a British botanist.
