Sonchella

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Description

"Herbs, perennial, of ± saline habitats. Stem erect, ± leafy. Synflorescence narrowly racemiform or paniculiform. Capitula with ca. 10 florets. Involucre cylindric. Outer phyllaries imbricate, gradually longer centripetally with longest ca. 1/3 of inner ones, glabrous; inner phyllaries linear-lanceolate, equal in length, margin scarious. Receptacle naked. Florets yellow. Achene cylindric to fusiform, subcompressed, with 5 main ribs alternating with (1 or)2 slender secondary ribs, apex truncate. Pappus white, caducous."A

Common names

Chinese (China): 小苦苣菜属 xiao ku ju cai shuB

Chromosome numbers

Diploid, x = 8 for Sonchella stenoma. A more recent report of x = 5 for this species may be erroneous.C

Systematics

Sonchella is a genus of two species distributed in E Central Asia (N China, Mongolia and E Russia), which unites Youngia stenoma, the single species of Y. sect. Stenophytum (Babcock & Stebbins 1937), nom. inval., and a second species formerly treated as Prenanthes angustifolia or Crepis pratensis, respectively. The two species are very similar to each other but differ in their synflorescence shape (Sennikov & Illarionova 2008; Shih & Kilian in Shih & al. 2011).

Sonchella has been confirmed in the molecular phylogenetic analyses of subtribe Crepidinae by J. W. Zhang & al. (in prep.) to be distant from Youngia. Instead it is nested in a clade including, among others, Dubyaea, Nabalus and Soroseris. A,D,E

Bibliography

A. Shih C. & Kilian N. - in Wu & al., Fl. China 20-21. 2011
B. Wu & al., Flora of China 20-21. 2011
C. Watanabe K., Index to chromosome numbers in Asteraceae.
D. Babcock & Stebbins, The genus Youngia in Publ. Carnegie Inst. Wash. 484. 1937
E. Sennikov A. N. & Illarionova I. D., Generic delimitation of the subtribe Ixeridinae newly segregated from Crepidiinae (Asteraceae - Lactuceae) in Komarovia 5: 57-118. 2008