ALBERT

Description: Anadendrum chlorospathum is described as a new species from Central Vietnam, unique in the genus by a glossy medium green spathe, flowers in which the perigone is shorter than the gynoecium, and having anthers longer at anthesis than the filaments.

Description: Sea surface salinity (SSS) is the least constrained major variable of the past (paleo) ocean but is fundamental in controlling the density of seawater and thus large-scale ocean circulation. The hydrogen isotopic composition (δD) of non-exchangeable hydrogen of algal lipids, specifically alkenones, has been proposed as a promising new proxy for paleo SSS. The δD of surface seawater is correlated with SSS, and laboratory culture studies have shown the δD of algal growth water to be reflected in the δD of alkenones. However, a large-scale field study testing the validity of this proxy is still lacking. Here we present the δD of open-ocean Atlantic and Pacific surface waters and coincident δD of alkenones sampled by underway filtration. Two transects of approximately 100° latitude in the Atlantic Ocean and more than 50° latitude in the Western Pacific sample much of the range of open ocean salinities and seawater δD, and thus allow probing the relationship between δD of seawater and alkenones. Overall, the open ocean δD alkenone data correlate significantly with SSS, and also agree remarkably well with δD water vs δD alkenone regressions developed from culture studies. Subtle deviations from these regressions are discussed in the context of physiological factors as recorded in the carbon isotopic composition of alkenones. In a best-case scenario, the data presented here suggest that SSS variations as low as 1.2 can be reconstructed from alkenone δD.

Description: A taxonomic revision of Flemingia subg. Rhynchosioides based on morphology and molecular information (matK and ITS) is presented. The subgenus comprises six herbaceous taxa (F. gracilis, F. mukerjeeana, F. nilgheriensis, F. rollae, F. tuberosa and F. vestita). All species except F. vestita are endemic to India. Morphological evidence and molecular phylogeny revealed that the subgenus is monophyletic. Nevertheless, the systematic position of F. tuberosa remains unclear on account of its unique ecology and inflorescence. A new species, F. mukerjeeana, is described and four binomials, namely F. gracilis, F. nilgheriensis, F. tuberosa and F. vestita have been lectotypified. Furthermore, all species have been described, illustrated and their ecology discussed. A taxonomic key including the recently described species from Thailand, F. sirindhorniae, is also provided for easy identification

Description: In preparing the treatment of Dracaena for Flore du Gabon and Flore d’Afrique centrale, a relatively high number of taxonomic and nomenclatural novelties were discovered; these are presented here. Within Dracaena five species and one forma are described as new, D. bushii, D. haemanthoides, D. marina, D. wakaensis, D. waltersiae and D. laxissima forma aureilicia. Each new species is provided with a full description and taxonomic notes. Apart from that, five species are reinstated, D. braunii, D. nitens, D. perrottetii, D. tholloniana and D. usambarensis. A further 23 names are treated here as a synonym for the first time: D. bequaertii, D. buettneri, D. cuspidibracteata, D. densifolia, D. gabonica, D. gazensis, D. ledermannii, D. letestui, D. litoralis, D. longipetiolata, D. monostachya var. angolensis, D. oddonii, D. perrottetii var. minor, D. poggei, D. pseudoreflexa, D. reflexa var. buchneri, D. rubroaurantiaca, D. soyauxiana, D. talbotii, D. tessmannii, D. usambarensis var. longifolia, D. vanderystii and Pleomele heudelotii, while for four names a neotype and for 14 names a lectotype has been designated. Distribution maps are provided for a total of 23 species. An index of taxon names is included.

Description: Changes in the life cycle of organisms (i.e. phenology) are one of the most widely used early-warning indicators of climate change, yet this remains poorly understood throughout the tropics. We exhaustively reviewed any published and unpublished study on fruiting phenology carried out at the community level in the American tropics and subtropics (latitudinal range: 26°N?26°S) to (1) provide a comprehensive overview of the current status of fruiting phenology research throughout the Neotropics; (2) unravel the climatic factors that have been widely reported as drivers of fruiting phenology; and (3) provide a preliminary assessment of the potential phenological responses of plants under future climatic scenarios. Despite the large number of phenological datasets uncovered (218), our review shows that their geographic distribution is very uneven and insufficient for the large surface of the Neotropics (~ 1 dataset per ~ 78,000 km2). Phenological research is concentrated in few areas with many studies (state of São Paulo, Brazil, and Costa Rica), whereas vast regions elsewhere are entirely unstudied. Sampling effort in fruiting phenology studies was generally low: the majority of datasets targeted fewer than 100 plant species (71%), lasted 2 years or less (72%), and only 10.4% monitored 〉 15 individuals per species. We uncovered only 10 sites with ten or more years of phenological monitoring. The ratio of numbers of species sampled to overall estimates of plant species richness was wholly insufficient for highly diverse vegetation types such as tropical rainforests, seasonal forest and cerrado, and only slightly more robust for less diverse vegetation types, such as deserts, arid shrublands and open grassy savannas. Most plausible drivers of phenology extracted from these datasets were environmental (78.5%), whereas biotic drivers were rare (6%). Among climatic factors, rainfall was explicitly included in 73.4% of cases, followed by air temperature (19.3%). Other environmental cues such as water level (6%), solar radiation or photoperiod (3.2%), and ENSO events (1.4%) were rarely addressed. In addition, drivers were analyzed statistically in only 38% of datasets and techniques were basically correlative, with only 4.8% of studies including any consideration of the inherently autocorrelated character of phenological time series. Fruiting peaks were significantly more often reported during the rainy season both in rainforests and cerrado woodlands, which is at odds with the relatively aseasonal character of the former vegetation type. Given that climatic models predict harsh future conditions for the tropics, we urgently need to determine the magnitude of changes in plant reproductive phenology and distinguish those from cyclical oscillations. Long-term monitoring and herbarium data are therefore key for detecting these trends. Our review shows that the unevenness in geographic distribution of studies, and diversity of sampling methods, vegetation types, and research motivation hinder the emergence of clear general phenological patterns and drivers for the Neotropics. We therefore call for prioritizing research in unexplored areas, and improving the quantitative component and statistical design of reproductive phenology studies to enhance our predictions of climate change impacts on tropical plants and animals.

Description: A deciduous shrub previously included in Ficus talbotii for many years, is now regarded as a new species, Ficus pongumphaii. It is morphologically distinct from F. talbotii with as typical characters the densely brown pubescent to tomentose or villous on leafy twig; the elliptic, suborbicular to obovate leaf blades that are brown tomentellous on the upper surface and brown floccose tomentose to villous underneath; the pedunculate figs are obovate, brown floccose or villous outside and have internal hairs. The leaf anatomy shows a multiple epidermis on both surfaces; enlarged lithocysts on both sides of the lamina, which are more abundant adaxially and with very few abaxially. The species, endemic to Thailand, is named after the great Thai dendrologist, Associate Professor Somnuek Pongumphai.

Description: An identification key to all the reported species of Hedyotis-Oldenlandia group (Hedyotis, Oldenlandia, Exallage, Leptopetalum, Scleromitrion and Debia) in Andaman & Nicobar Islands is presented with one new species, Oldenlandia smita-crishnae, described from Saddle Peak forests of North Andaman, India. It shares some characters with Oldenlandia herbacea, O. corymbosa and O. pseudocorymbosa. However, it is remarkable for its abaxially puberulous leaves, divaricate stipules, ellipsoid to obovoid hypanthium, pink-striped corolla lobes and 20–30-seeded, inserted capsule. Furthermore, a new combination in Exallage is proposed and lectotypes for Spermacoce cristata, S. costata, Hedyotis vestita and Oldenlandia stocksii are designated.