Comparative Study of the Inflorescence, Spikelet and Flower Development in Species of Cynodonteae (Chloridoideae - Poaceae)

PILATTI V; MUCHUT S; UBERTI MANASERO N; VEGETTI AC; REINHEIMER R

BOTANICAL JOURNAL OF THE LINNEAN SOCIETY

WILEY-BLACKWELL PUBLISHING, INC

Lugar: Londres; Año: 2019

0024-4074

The tribe Cynodonteae (Chloridoideae: Poaceae) is a diverse group of grasses. Within the tribe, the subtribesHilariinae, Monanthochloinae, Boutelouinae, Scleropogoninae, and Muhlenbergiinae are of particularinterest given their members display wide variations of inflorescence forms. The inflorescence morphologyof the group have been revisited recently; however their development remains largely unexplored. The aimof this work is to contribute additional information on the development of Cynodonteae inflorescences bygenerating data on Distichlis, Bouteloua, Munroa, Erioneuron, and Muhlenbergia and compare them withprevious works on other grasses. Using SEM images we have identified common developmental patternsamong grasses and described developmental novelties for Bouteloua, Distichlis, and Muhlenbergia. Wefound that inflorescence of disparate grasses with similar structural plan develops following same model.Results presented here allows us to postulate that a delicate balance of phytohormones may command earlydevelopment of grass inflorescence branching system by controlling direction of first-order branchesdifferentiation. We also think, that at some stages of development what happens first generate pleiotropicseffects on developmental traits that occur after. We reaffirm that this type of approaches on the study ofmorphology are of immense value since they are the connection between mature forms and the underlyinggenetics.