Article

Floral geometric morphometrics unveils a new cauliflorous species of Aristolochia (Aristolochiaceae) from the Guiana Shield

Authors:
  • Instituto Nacional da Mata Atlântica - INMA
  • Smithsonian & Oregon State
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Abstract

Aristolochia wankeana (Aristolochiaceae), a new species from French Guiana and Guyana, is described and illustrated here. Floral traits, primarily of the shape and size of the perianth limb, examined through a morphometric geometric analysis, are diagnostic to distinguish the new species from its relatives A. cornuta and A. iquitensis. The species belongs to Aristolochia subser. Anthocaulicae, characterized by having extremely short cauliflorous racemes with scale-like, triangular subtending bracts. This is the first study that uses morphometrics for taxonomic purposes in Aristolochia, an approach that becomes promising to solve species complexes in this genus.

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... It forms a species complex with A. cornuta Mast. and A. iquitensis O.C.Schmidt, both being distinguished by perianth analysis using geometric morphometry (Freitas et al. 2020). Recent collections in Amazonas state, Brazil, expanded the distribution of A. wankeana and here we present the first record of this species for Brazil, with a morphological description, taxonomic comments, an updated distribution map, highresolution photographs and an updated identification key for the species that occur in the Brazilian Amazon. ...
... The material was deposited in the INPA herbarium [acronym according to Thiers (2024, continuously updated)]. The species determination was based on Freitas et al. (2020). We used characters collected in the field and observed the material available in the herbarium. ...
... The new collections, observed bearing flowers and fruits in August, represent a novelty in the phenological knowledge of the species. According to Freitas et al. (2020), specimens bearing flowers were collected in April, July, and between October and December, while specimens bearing both flowers and fruits were collected in April and between October and December. ...
Article
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Aristolochia comprises about 450 species, occurring mainly in tropical regions. Here, we record for the first time Aristolochia wankeana in Brazil, specifically in two municipalities in the state of Amazonas (Presidente Figueiredo and Rio Preto da Eva). Previously, this species had only been recorded in Guyana and French Guiana. We provide the species description based on the new records, a preliminary extinction risk assessment, photographic plates, an updated geographic distribution map, ecological comments, and an updated key for species identification of Aristolochia subser. Anthocaulicae from the Brazilian Amazon.
... Flowers in Aristolochia are remarkably diverse in terms of size, color patterning, epidermal specialization, and shape of the perianth (Freitas et al. 2020b). Often, these traits are crucial as diagnostic traits at a species level (González 1990;González & Stevenson 2000); thus, the absence of flowers often precludes the identification. ...
... Plant morphometrics allows the assessment of pattern variation at low cost, provides consistent results, and helps solving taxonomic uncertainties at both species and population levels (Marhold 2011;Turco et al. 2022). Geometric Morphometrics (GM) has been applied to assess leaf (Cheng et al. 2021;Danila & Alejandro 2021;Guamba et al. 2021) and/or flower quantitative variation to distinguish species (Fragoso-Martínez et al. 2015;Menini-Neto et al. 2019;Freitas et al. 2020b;Guamba et al. 2021;Pessoa et al. 2020;Araújo et al. 2023), by identifying homologous points across samples, called landmarks, and comparing the format of each one of the structures in its entirety (Christodoulou et al. 2020). Linear morphometrics, on the other hand, uses only measurable values, such as length and width, not considering the shape (Christodoulou et al. 2020). ...
... Morphometric analysis -Samples: Despite floral GM having been successfully used before to solve a species complex in Aristolochia (Freitas et al. 2020b Morphometric analysis: Landmark-based method: The shape of the leaf blades was outlined with strings of semi-landmark points. It was sampled with a configuration of 26 points, including two landmarks (base and apex) and 24 semi-landmarks, 22 of these representing homologous lines, and the remaining two (between points 23-2-24; Fig. 1) corresponding to the blade base. ...
Article
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Aristolochia hypoglauca and A. paulistana (Aristolochiaceae) are two species that inhabit the Brazilian Atlantic Forest. They highly resemble each other especially on the size and overall shape of the caudate perianth, which causes confusion in herbaria determinations. We applied geometric morphometrics (GM) to overcome this taxonomic uncertainty. GM was based on the landmark method applied to leaves of all specimens available mostly in Brazilian herbaria. The GM results supported the recognition of the two species, as the two principal components were responsible for 94.97% of the variation assessed through the principal component analysis (PCA). The Discriminant Function and the Cross-validation tests resulted in the maximum percentage of correctly classified cases (100%). The Procrustes distance (0.2252; p< 0.0001), and the Mahalanobis Distance (8.4473; p< 0.0001) provide statistical support for leaf shape differences with taxonomic significance. Thus, we revisit the taxonomy and comparative morphology of both species, and compare them with other Aristolochia species with caudate floral limb native to Brazil, and commented the phenology, distribution and habitat, and conservation status. Additionally, we proposed the epitypification of A. hypoglauca, given that the holotype does not fulfill the purpose of precise application of the name. Keywords: Flora of Brazil; geometric morphometrics; leaf morphometrics; Piperales; threatened species
... F.Gonz alez), which includes species that have ramiflorous to cauliflorous racemes with very short internodes, and flowers subtended by reduced bracts (Gonz alez 1990). It is comprised of ca. 25 species, distributed mainly in the Amazon basin and the Atlantic Forest in Brazil (Freitas et al. 2019(Freitas et al. , 2020. This subseries was retrieved as monophyletic in a phylogenetic study based on morphological characters only (Gonz alez and Stevenson 2002). ...
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Two new cauliflorous species of Aristolochia subseries Anthocaulicae from southern Central America are described and illustrated. Aristolochia guanacastensis from northwestern Costa Rica resembles A. ruiziana, from which it is distinguished by having glabrous and narrower leaves, larger flowers without a syrinx, and shorter fruits. Aristolochia povedae from the Caribbean slope of Costa Rica and Panama is similar to A. cordiflora, but it is distinguished by its smaller, suborbicular and concave perianth limb with a shallower sinus, and slightly larger fruits. Comments about their distribution, habitat, phenology, conservation status, and distinction from related species are provided, and also a key to the species of Aristolochia subseries Anthocaulicae present in Central America. Evidence that supports the synonymization of A. cruenta under A. goudotii is presented.
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Aristolochia dalyi, from western Peruvian and Brazilian Amazonia, andA. bahiensis, from Bahia, Brazil, are described and illustrated. The species belong toAristolochia ser.Thyrsicae andA. ser.Hexandrae subser.Anthocaulicae, respectively. A key to the eight western Amazonian species of the seriesThyrsicae is presented.Aristolochia dalyi closely resemblesA. silvatica Barb. Rodr. from the Río Negro basin, andA. bahiensis—the first cauliflorous species ofAristolochia known from the Mata Atlantica—is similar toA. guentheri O. C. Schmidt andA. klugii O. C. Schmidt, from the Western Amazon basin. Characters based primarily on the perianth shape, along with some vegetative features, are used to distinguish the two newly described species from their close relatives.
11C-D) (vs. linear lobes at angles of 150-180º in A. cornuta (Fig. 11A) and strongly falcate and horse-shoe shaped at angles of 15-40º in A. iquitensis) (Fig. 11B), and develop fimbriae at their distal portions (vs. limb efimbriate in A. cornuta and A. iquitensis
  • Fig
Fig. 11C-D) (vs. linear lobes at angles of 150-180º in A. cornuta (Fig. 11A) and strongly falcate and horse-shoe shaped at angles of 15-40º in A. iquitensis) (Fig. 11B), and develop fimbriae at their distal portions (vs. limb efimbriate in A. cornuta and A. iquitensis (González 1990, 1994, BFG 2015, 2018).
A. iquitensis 1. Leaves broad, 1-2 times longer than wider, ovate, base cuneate, truncate or slightly cordate, limb of the perianth not emarginated at its base, with an upper and a lower lobe
  • ...................................... . Cm
A. cornuta 3. Lobes of the perianth limb curved downwards, oblong, hypocrepiform, 0.5-1.2 × 1-2 cm...........................................A. iquitensis 1. Leaves broad, 1-2 times longer than wider, ovate, base cuneate, truncate or slightly cordate, limb of the perianth not emarginated at its base, with an upper and a lower lobe.........................................................................................................................................4 4. Base of the leaf lamina not peltate; upper lobe of the perianth limb 4-5 cm wide.......................................... A. klugii O.C.Schmidt 4. Base of the leaf lamina slightly peltate; upper lobe of the perianth limb 0.2-2 cm wide..................................................................5 5. Lower lobe of the perianth limb obovate, up to 0.8 cm long, inner surface smooth............................................. A. cremersii Poncy 5. Lower lobe of the perianth limb linear, ca. 4 cm long, inner surface papillate............................................................ A. flava Poncy FIGure 0. Geographic distribution of Aristolochia wankeana in Guyana and French Guiana (black dots).
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