作者

LIU, TANG-SHUI and KAO, MUH-TSUEN

型態特徵

Erect, prostrate or scandent annual or perennial herbs, rarely undershrubs. Leaves alternate or opposite, simple, entire or obsoletely serrate-dentate, extipulate. Flowers small, greenish, white, pink, rarely yellow, actinomorphic, usually bisexual, in spikes, heads, racemes or panicles; bracts and bracteoles often scarious, the bracteoles sometimes hooked; perianth segments 3–5, free or nearly so, imbricate, more or less dry and membranaceous, mostly falling with fruit, rarely persistent; stamens as many as and opposite the perianth segments, hypogynous, filaments usually united at base into a cup or tube, often with staminodes between them, anthers 1 or 2-celled; ovary of 2 or 3 united carpels, superior, 1-celled, with 1 to many ovules on a basal funicle, the style present or not, stigma capitate or 2 or 3-fid. Fruit mostly an utricle or a circumscissile capsule, rarely a berry or drupe; seeds often lenticular, smooth; embryo annular, surrounding the mealy endosperm.

屬

Genera about 64, with about 800 species mainly in the tropical regions of the world; nine genera with 19 species, including some introduced ones, in Taiwan.

參考文獻

作者

LIU, HO-YIH

型態特徵

Annual or perennial herbs, sometimes shrubs or small trees. Stems often succulent or jointed, sometimes both. Leaves alternate or opposite, simple, usually exstipulate. Flowers small, actinomorphic, usually green, bisexual or unisexual, sometimes polygamous, usually wind pollinated, solitary or in small clusters in leaf axils or in axillary bracteate fascicles or panicles; perianth uniseriate, sometimes wanting; tepals mostly 5, free or connate at base or connate almost to apex; stamens usually as many as and opposite tepals, epitepalous; ovary superior or rarely half inferior, 2-5-carpellate, unilocular, with single ovule, styles 1-3, sometimes wanting, stigmas as many as carpels. Fruit a one-seeded utricle or rarely an achene; seeds with abundant perisperm, true endosperm absent.

參考文獻