Coleotrype

Coleotrype
Coleotrype natalensis growing in a greenhouse; the plant is originally from the Limpopo Province of South Africa.
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
(unranked):	Angiosperms
(unranked):	Monocots
(unranked):	Commelinids
Order:	Commelinales
Family:	Commelinaceae
Subfamily:	Commelinoideae
Tribe:	Tradescantineae
Genus:	Coleotrype C.B. Clarke, 1881
Type species
C. natalensis C.B. Clarke
Species
Coleotrype natalensis Coleotrype baroni Coleotrype madegascarica Coleotrype brueckneriana Coleotrype goudotii Coleotrype lutea Coleotrype laurentii Coleotrype udzungwaensis

Coleotrype is a genus of perennial monocotyledonous flowering plants in the dayflower family. It is found in Africa and Madagascar and consists of about nine species. The genus is characterised by its extremely contracted inflorescences with each unit being subtended by a relatively large bract, and the petals that form a short tube at the base in which the stamens are attached to it. Flowers may be either zygomorphic or actinomorphic, and anthers release their pollen either through a pore at the tip or slits down the sides. They are typically encountered in forest understories.^[1] Analysis of DNA sequences has shown that it is most closely related to the genus Amischotolype, while these two are in turn most closely related to the genus Cyanotis plus its very close relative Belosynapsis. These four genera form a clade that is found only in the Old World, while all of its immediate ancestors are present only in the New World.^[2]

References

1. ^ Faden, Robert B. (1998), "Commelinaceae", in Kubitzki, Klaus, The Families and Genera of Vascular Plants, 4, Berlin: Springer, pp. 109–128, ISBN 3-540-64061-4 
2. ^ Evans, Timothy M.; Sytsma, Kenneth J.; Faden, Robert B.; Givnish, Thomas J. (2003), "Phylogenetic Relationships in the Commelinaceae: II. A Cladistic Analysis of rbcL Sequences and Morphology", Systematic Botany 28 (2): 270–292