Gossypium tomentosum

Gossypium tomentosum
Gossypium tomentosum
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
(unranked): Angiosperms
(unranked): Eudicots
(unranked): Rosids
Order: Malvales
Family: Malvaceae
Genus: Gossypium
Subgenus: Karpas
Species: G. tomentosum
Binomial name
Gossypium tomentosum
Nutt. ex Seem.[1]

Gossypium tomentosum, commonly known as Maʻo or Hawaiian cotton, is a species of cotton plant that is endemic to the Hawaiian Islands. It inhabits low shrublands at elevations from sea level to 120 m (390 ft).[2] Maʻo is a shrub that reaches a height of 1.5–5 ft (0.46–1.5 m) and a diameter of 5–10 ft (1.5–3.0 m).[3] The seed hairs (lint) are short and reddish brown, unsuitable for spinning or twisting into thread.

Genetic studies indicate that Hawaiian cotton is related to American species of Gossypium, with its closest relative Gossypium hirsutum.[4] Its ancestor may have come to the islands from the Americas as a seed on the wind or in the droppings of a bird, or as part of floating debris.[5]

Cotton boll of Gossypium tomentosum

References

  1. ^ "Taxon: Gossypium tomentosum Nutt. ex Seem.". Germplasm Resources Information Network. United States Department of Agriculture. 1999-08-12. http://www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/taxon.pl?17948. Retrieved 2011-09-09. 
  2. ^ "mao, huluhulu". Hawaii Ethnobotany Online Database. Bernice P. Bishop Museum. http://data.bishopmuseum.org/ethnobotanydb/ethnobotany.php?b=d&ID=mao_G. Retrieved 2011-09-09. 
  3. ^ "Gossypium tomentosum". Hawaiian Native Plant Propagation Database. University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. http://www2.hawaii.edu/~eherring/hawnprop/gos-tome.htm. Retrieved 2009-03-13. 
  4. ^ Small, R. L.; Ryburn, J. A.; Cronn, R. C.; Seelanan, T.; Wendel, J. F. (1 September 1998). "The Tortoise and the Hare: Choosing between Noncoding Plastome and Nuclear Adh Sequences for Phylogeny Reconstruction in a Recently Diverged Plant Group". American Journal of Botany (American Journal of Botany, Vol. 85, No. 9) 85 (9): 1301–1315. doi:10.2307/2446640. ISSN 00029122. JSTOR 2446640. PMID 21685016. http://www.amjbot.org/cgi/content/full/85/9/1301. 
  5. ^ DeJoode, Daniel R.; Wendel, Jonathan F. (November 1992). "Genetic Diversity and Origin of the Hawaiian Islands Cotton, Gossypium tomentosum". American Journal of Botany (American Journal of Botany, Vol. 79, No. 11) 79 (11): 1311–1319. doi:10.2307/2445059. JSTOR 2445059. "Gossypium tomentosum is proposed, based on biogeographic evidence and molecular data, to have originated by transoceanic dispersal from a Mesoamerican progenitor." 

External links

Media related to Gossypium tomentosum at Wikimedia Commons Data related to Gossypium tomentosum at Wikispecies

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