Corresponding author: Alex V. Popovkin (
Guest editor: Sandra Knapp
A new species of
Uma nova espécie de
Morphologically,
The new species was discovered by José Carlos Mendes Santos (a.k.a. Louro), the house help and fellow plant collector of the first author, when squatting near the latter's house. The tiny plant of no more than 3 cm in height would have been otherwise easily missed. A colony of half-dozen plants, within 5 square meters, was initially discovered. Two more colonies in the same restricted area were eventually uncovered. The habitat is an open-soil roadside, partially covered by leaf litter, at the border of a
Relationships among the species of
Haec species
Similar to
Annual herb, 1.5–25 cm tall. Roots fibrous, not very extensive. Stem branched at base, with reddish tint, with 4–6 prominent ribs decurrent from the leaf bases; interpetiolar stipules triangular, with abundant papillae on outside. Leaves opposite as well as 4 together higher up on the main branch under the inflorescence, 6–20 mm long, 2–5 mm wide, elliptic to ovate; secondary veins 4–6 pairs, arcuate, inconspicuous below and above, midrib raised below; base acute, with decurrent lamina; margin flat or slightly revolute, entire; apex obtuse; upper side with many short, transparent papilloid hairs, 0.1–0.3 mm long; lower side glabrous; petiole 1–2 mm long. Inflorescence variable, solitary (occasionally multiple), typically a one-sided cyme (rarely a simple cyme/dichasium or a single flower), unbranched, (1-)4–7-flowered, up to 28 mm long, without bracts or with 1–2 tiny bracts subtending flowers; peduncle 7–15 mm. Flowers actinomorphic, perfect, 5- (rarely 6-) merous. Calyx divided almost to base, green, persistent in fruit; lobes triangular, acuminate, 0.8–1.4 mm long, c. 0.3 mm wide, with slightly papillose margins. Corolla sympetalous, tubular, slightly widening towards mouth, 4–8 mm long, 2.5–3.0 mm wide at mouth, white with pink lobes, aestivation valvate with individual corolla lobes plicate in bud, lobes unfolded when open, closing after a short (8-hour) anthesis, later withering and deciduous; lobes triangular, 1.0–1.5 mm long, ca. 1 mm wide, erect, acute, with smooth margin. Stamens epipetalous and adnate to corolla up to middle of the tube, of equal length, included in corolla; filaments flattened; anthers 0.7–0.8 mm long, shallowly sagittate at base, truncate at apex. Ovary bicarpellate, bilocular, ovoid, ca. 0.4 mm tall, with truncate apex; style 3–6 mm long (including stigma), simple, articulated at 0.5–1.00 mm above the ovary, mostly dehiscent in fruit (except the persistent base); stigma simple, papillose, ‘brush-like' at the height of the anthers. Fruit a bilobed capsule, 1.5–2 mm tall, 2–3 mm wide; dehiscing septicidally, loculicidally and circumscissilly, leaving behind on the rachis a persistent, boat-shaped base with pointed tips (‘
This species is known from only two localities in northeastern Bahia (Brazil), about 30 km from the Atlantic coastline.
The species has been found on sandy,leaf litter- or moss-covered soil areas along the border of a
The geocarpy, i.e. weak geocarpy (depositors, in Hylander's [1929] terminology), of this species was initially observed on plants transplanted to a pot kept on a windowsill, allowing for daily/hourly observations. Two growth forms have been observed: one with inflorescences forming after the first three pairs of leaves are formed (usually, with a long internode between the first pair of leaves and subsequent two pairs), with the plant height at that stage of about 1 cm, and the other with inflorescences forming after four or five pairs of leaves and the plant reaching the height from 10 to 25 cm. The lower-forming inflorescences at the start of the fruit set would bend down to the soil, depositing the ripe fruit on the ground, while the higher-forming inflorescences would bend down noticeably but, because of the main stem height, would be unable to touch the soil surface. Inflorescences with the fruit not set (a rare phenomenon) stay upright. Later observations of plants growing on moss-covered ground showed that the capsules are actually buried in the soft substrate (
The specific name refers to the sometimes repeated bending of its infructescence branches to the ground, figuratively evoking an image of the etiquette of genuflexion.
The species is known from only a handful of collections from two restricted populations in a non-protected area (private land), and should therefore be assessed as Data Deficient for EOO and AOO, following
The species has been found flowering and fruiting from March to November during the local rainy season. It takes about 3–4 weeks from anthesis to fruit maturity. Living plants have not been observed from December to early March.
Photographs in the field and of cultivated material were made using a Panasonic DMC-ZS3 camera. Pressed and dried herbarium material of
Several species concepts were utilized to identify and define this particular species, which is in line with previous species concepts used in this group (
Sequences from the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) of nuclear ribosomal DNA were used to reconstruct a phylogenetic tree of 15 species of
Complete phylogenetic results are presented in Appendix I. Thus far, we have been able to include only one other Brazilian species in the phylogenetic analysis, therefore our results are to be viewed as preliminary but having a bearing on the status of the new species. ITS sequences confirm the position of Strict consensus tree derived from molecular data (ITS and coded gaps) showing phylogenetic relationships of 50% majority rule consensus tree from the Bayesian analyses. Numbers are clade posterior probability (pp) values; thickened branches indicate pp = 1.00. The genus name
The main goal with our phylogenetic analysis, however, was to place
Like section
The sister group to
This work was partially funded through a grant provided to LS (USDA/NJAES-NJ17112). M. C. Molina received a grant as a three-month Visiting Scientist from Estancias Breves Investigación, URJC, Spain. We are grateful to the staff at the HUEFS and NY herbaria for their help. We thank Daniela Zappi for her early input in the project, and two anonymous reviewers for constructive criticism on an earlier version of this manuscript. Bobbi Angell provided the line drawings; Cynthia Frasier provided DNA sequences from Loganiaceae; Jason R. Grant translated the diagnosis; and Domingos Benício Oliveira Silva Cardoso helped with the Portuguese abstract.
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DQ499095 |
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DQ358879 |
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AF054635 |
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AF177992 |
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JN005877 |
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AF178008 |
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JN005880 |
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AF178000 |
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AF177991 |
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JN005882 |
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JN005883 |
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AF178006 |
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JF937940 |
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JF937956 |
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JF938015 |
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JF938021 |
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The nuclear ITS rDNA region was amplified using the primers 5'-AACAAGGTTTCCGTAGGTGA-3' (modified from Baldwin 1992) and 5'-GCTACGTTCTTCATCGATGC-3' (
Additional ITS sequences from other
Material for phylogenetic analysis using ITS sequences, with voucher information, Genbank accession number, and tribal classification according to
Species | Tribal classification | Infrageneric classification of Spigelia, if applicable | Genbank accession number | Voucher or publication |
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Antonieae |
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Berry et al. 5771 (NY) | |
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Antonieae |
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Berry & Brako 5522 (NY) | |
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Strychneae |
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Ceming 9611186 (MO) | |
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Strychneae |
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Klackenberg & Lundin 214 (NY) | |
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Loganieae |
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Wright et al. (2006) | |
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Loganieae |
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Motley 1203 (BISH) | |
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Loganieae |
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Hubbard 4198 (G) | |
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Spigelieae |
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Forste et al. PIF24800 (NY) | |
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Spigelieae |
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Anonymous 20495 (NY) | |
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Spigelieae |
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Gould 150 (TEX/LL) | |
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Strychneae |
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Struwe 1301 (NY) | |
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Antonieae |
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Stone 14107 (HUH) | |
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Spigelieae | Anthelmiae |
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Worthington 21205 (NY) |
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Spigelieae |
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Gould 139 (TEX/LL) | |
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Spigelieae |
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Bok Tower Gardens Rare Plant Collection, Lake Wales Florida (living collection) | |
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Spigelieae |
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Popovkin 602 (NY) | |
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Spigelieae | Anthelmiae |
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Gould 7 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Coelostylis |
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Gould 103 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Anthelmiae |
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Gould 162 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Graciles |
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Taylor et al. 1508 (K) |
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Spigelieae | Coelostylis |
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Goldman 433 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Graciles |
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Gould 163 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Stenophyllae |
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Zardini & Velasquez 27462 (G) |
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Spigelieae | Stenophyllae |
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Williams 9565 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Speciosae |
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Gould 136 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Speciosae |
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Panero 5758 (TEX/LL) |
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Spigelieae | Coelostylis |
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Gould 135 (TEX/LL) |
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Strychneae |
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Merello 1338 (MO) | |
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Strychneae |
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Medri etal. 446 (NY) | |
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Strychneae |
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Maxwell 90–622 (MO) | |
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Strychneae |
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Rodal et al. 502 (MO) | |
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Strychneae |
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Liesner & Gonzalez 9170 (MO) |
The
For the second, Bayesian, analyses we chose the best fitting nucleotide substitution model (excluding the binary indel partition), using the Akaike information criterion (AIC) in JMODELTEST ver. 0.1.1 (
The strict consensus trees from these two analyses are largely congruent, with a few exceptions. The results from ITS only differ from matrix 2 (ITS with coded gaps) by: 1) positioning a species of
The new species,
In the Bayesian analysis,
DNA alignment of ITS from Loganiaceae taxa, especially
Copyright notice: This dataset is made available under the Open Database License (http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1.0/). The Open Database License (ODbL) is a license agreement intended to allow users to freely share, modify, and use this Dataset while maintaining this same freedom for others, provided that the original source and author(s) are credited.
Alignment of ITS from Loganiaceae taxa, especially
Copyright notice: This dataset is made available under the Open Database License (http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1.0/). The Open Database License (ODbL) is a license agreement intended to allow users to freely share, modify, and use this Dataset while maintaining this same freedom for others, provided that the original source and author(s) are credited.
Bayesian run-file of ITS plus coded gaps from Loganiaceae taxa, especially
Copyright notice: This dataset is made available under the Open Database License (http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1.0/). The Open Database License (ODbL) is a license agreement intended to allow users to freely share, modify, and use this Dataset while maintaining this same freedom for others, provided that the original source and author(s) are credited.