Platycarpha
Genus of plants
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Platycarpha is a genus of South African plants within the family Asteraceae.[2][3] It contains a single species, Platycarpha glomerata, which is native to the Cape Provinces and KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa.
| Platycarpha | |
|---|---|
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Eudicots |
| Clade: | Asterids |
| Order: | Asterales |
| Family: | Asteraceae |
| Tribe: | Platycarpheae |
| Genus: | Platycarpha Less. |
| Species: | P. glomerata |
| Binomial name | |
| Platycarpha glomerata (Thunb.) Less. | |
| Synonyms[1] | |
| |
The name Platycarpha is derived from two Greek words, platys "broad" and karphos "a chip of straw or wood, a scale, a dry stalk".[4] The name was first used by Christian Friedrich Lessing in 1831.[5] The type species is Platycarpha glomerata.[6] This species had been named Cynara glomerata by Carl Peter Thunberg in 1800,[7] and was moved to Platycarpha by A.P. de Candolle in 1836 in Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis.[8]
The genus formerly contained three species. Studies suggested splitting Platycarpha into two genera, Platycarpha and Platycarphella, with two species placed in Platycarphella.[9][10][11] The systematic position of Platycarpha has long been regarded with uncertainty. Most authors have placed it in the tribe Arctotideae[10] until molecular phylogenetic studies showed it to be closer to Vernonieae.[12] In 2009, the new tribe Platycarpheae was established for Platycarpha and Platycarphella.[13]