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Mesembryanthemum Tomentosum
''Mesembryanthemum tomentosum'', synonyms including ''Brownanthus pubescens'', is a species of plant in the family Aizoaceae. It is native to the Cape Provinces and Namibia. Its natural habitats are dry savanna and rocky areas. Taxonomy The species was first described by Nicholas Edward Brown in 1928 as ''Trichocyclus pubescens''. It was transferred to the genus ''Brownanthus'' by Arthur Allman Bullock in 1937 (as ''Brownanthus pubescens''). A molecular phylogenetic study in 2007 concluded that ''Brownanthus'' was embedded in ''Mesembryanthemum'', which as then circumscribed was not monophyletic. Accordingly, all the species of ''Brownanthus'' were transferred to an enlarged ''Mesembryanthemum''. As the name ''Mesembryanthemum pubescens'' had already been used in 1795 for a different species (now '' Gibbaeum pubescens''), a replacement name In biological nomenclature, a ''nomen novum'' (Latin for "new name"), replacement name (or new replacement name, new substitute name, subs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sanddrif
Sanddrif is a town in Richtersveld Local Municipality in the Northern Cape province of South Africa, on the banks of the Orange River. It is located 57 km east of Alexander Bay. Mining in the region began in the 1900s leading to the displacement of the indigenous Nama people. Diamond mines were again established in the 1970s, bringing a source of employment but also socio-economic upheaval, threatening the traditional Nama lifestyle. The subsequent migration of Xhosa people who came to the area to work in the mines led Sanddrif to acquire the nickname of "Rainbow Town". Sanddrif has nevertheless seen ethnic conflict between the indigenous Namas and the Xhosa migrants. The Baken diamond mine The Baken diamond mine is a diamond mine located along the lower Orange River in South Africa. The mine is owned and operated by Lower Orange River Diamonds. The central processing plant has been operational at Baken since 2001. In 2004, the Bak ..., located outside Sanddrif, was open ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mesembryanthemum
''Mesembryanthemum'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Aizoaceae, indigenous to southern Africa. As with many members of that family, it is characterized by long-lasting flower heads. Flowers of ''Mesembryanthemum'' protect their gametes from night-time dews or frosts but open in sunlight. There is an obvious evolutionary advantage to doing this; where sun, dew, frost, wind or predators are likely to damage exposed reproductive organs, closing may be advantageous during times when flowers are unlikely to attract pollinators. Many ''Mesembryanthemum'' species are known as ice plants because of the glistening globular bladder cells covering their stems, fruit and leaves, "... they sparkle like ice crystals". In South Africa, Mesembryanthemums are known as "vygies" (from Afrikaans "vy"), although that term refers to many plants in the family Aizoaceae. Species formerly placed in ''Mesembryanthemum'' have been transferred to other genera, such as '' Cleretum'' and '' Car ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flora Of Namibia
The wildlife of Namibia is composed of its flora and fauna. Namibia's endangered species include the wild dog, black rhino, oribi and puku. Endangered species Namibia has many endangered species within its national parks and wildlife resorts. The puku antelope is limited to about 100 individuals along the Chobe River in Botswana and the Linyati marshes in Namibia. The black rhino and white rhino have suffered the most from poaching and are on the verge of extinction. If there had been no effort to save them in the last 20 years they most likely would have disappeared. While both species occur naturally in Namibia, in many of the reserves they have been reintroduced. The country also has the largest population in southern Africa of cheetahs not contained within national parks. There are over twenty species of antelope ranging from the largest, the eland, to the smallest, the Damara dik-dik. The gemsbok, a striking antelope with long symmetrical horns and distinctiv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew is a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. An internationally important botanical research and education institution, it employs 1,100 staff. Its board of trustees is chaired by Dame Amelia Fawcett. The organisation manages botanic gardens at Kew in Richmond upon Thames in south-west London, and at Wakehurst, a National Trust property in Sussex which is home to the internationally important Millennium Seed Bank, whose scientists work with partner organisations in more than 95 countries. Kew, jointly with the Forestry Commission, founded Bedgebury National Pinetum in Kent in 1923, specialising in growing conifers. In 1994, the Castle Howard Arboretum Trust, which runs the Yorkshire Arboretum, was formed as a partnership between Kew and the Castle Howard Estate. In 2019, the organisation had 2,316,699 public visitors at Kew, and 312,813 at Wakehurst. Its site ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plants Of The World Online
Plants of the World Online (POWO) is an online taxonomic database published by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. History Following the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew launched Plants of the World Online in March 2017 with the goal of creating an exhaustive online database of all seed-bearing plants worldwide. (Govaerts wrongly speaks of "Convention for Botanical Diversity (CBD)). The initial focus was on tropical African flora, particularly flora ''Zambesiaca'', flora of West and East Tropical Africa. Since March 2024, the website has displayed AI-generated predictions of the extinction risk for each plant. Description The database uses the same taxonomical source as the International Plant Names Index, which is the World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP). The database contains information on the world's flora gathered from 250 years of botanical research. It aims to make available data from projects that no longer have an online ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
International Plant Names Index
The International Plant Names Index (IPNI) describes itself as "a database of the names and associated basic bibliographical details of seed plants, ferns and lycophytes." Coverage of plant names is best at the rank of species and genus. It includes basic bibliographical details associated with the names. Its goals include eliminating the need for repeated reference to primary sources for basic bibliographic information about plant names. The IPNI also maintains a list of standardized Author citation (botany), author abbreviations. These were initially based on Authors of Plant Names, Brummitt & Powell (1992), but new names and abbreviations are continually added. Description IPNI is the product of a collaboration between The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (Index Kewensis), The Harvard University Herbaria (Gray Herbarium Index), and the Australian National Herbarium (Australian Plant Name Index, APNI). The IPNI database is a collection of the names registered by the three cooperating ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nomen Novum
In biological nomenclature, a ''nomen novum'' (Latin for "new name"), replacement name (or new replacement name, new substitute name, substitute name) is a replacement scientific name that is created when technical, nomenclatural reasons have made it impossible to continue using the previous name (for example because it was discovered to be a homonym – spelled the same as an existing, older name). ''Nomen novum'' does not apply when a name is changed for taxonomic reasons (representing a change in scientific insight). It is frequently abbreviated, ''e.g.'' ''nomen nov.'', ''nom. nov.''. Zoology In zoology establishing a new replacement name is a nomenclatural act and it must be expressly proposed to substitute a previously established and available name. Often, the older name cannot be used because another animal was described earlier with exactly the same name. For example, Lindholm discovered in 1913 that a generic name ''Jelskia'' established by Bourguignat in 1877 for a E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gibbaeum Pubescens
''Gibbaeum'' is a genus of about 21 species of small succulent plants of the family Aizoaceae, indigenous to the Little Karoo region of South Africa. The name "Gibbaeum" comes from the Latin ''gibbosus'' (hunchback) Description These dwarf succulents are characterized by distinctively asymmetrical pairs of leaves, mostly globular or sometimes thick and arcuate. The sizes of the leaves of each pair are nearly always different. Gibbaeums grow in clumps and produce pink or white flowers in spring. Distribution Genus ''Gibbaeum'' is predominantly indigenous to the Little Karoo region of the Western Cape Province, South Africa. A few species extend outside of this region. Three species extend north into the Great Karoo region: '' Gibbaeum gibbosum'', '' Gibbaeum heathii'' and '' Gibbaeum nuciforme''. Two extend south into the Overberg region: '' Gibbaeum esterhuyseniae'' and '' Gibbaeum hartmannianum''. Cultivation Sunny exposure and well drained soil. Their natural range spans the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monophyly
In biological cladistics for the classification of organisms, monophyly is the condition of a taxonomic grouping being a clade – that is, a grouping of organisms which meets these criteria: # the grouping contains its own most recent common ancestor (or more precisely an ancestral population), i.e. excludes non-descendants of that common ancestor # the grouping contains all the descendants of that common ancestor, without exception Monophyly is contrasted with paraphyly and polyphyly as shown in the second diagram. A ''paraphyletic'' grouping meets 1. but not 2., thus consisting of the descendants of a common ancestor, excepting one or more monophyletic subgroups. A ''polyphyletic'' grouping meets neither criterion, and instead serves to characterize convergent relationships of biological features rather than genetic relationships – for example, night-active primates, fruit trees, or aquatic insects. As such, these characteristic features of a polyphyletic grouping are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Circumscription (taxonomy)
In biological taxonomy, circumscription is the content of a taxon, that is, the delimitation of which subordinate taxa are parts of that taxon. For example, if we determine that species X, Y, and Z belong in genus A, and species T, U, V, and W belong in genus B, those are our circumscriptions of those two genera. Another systematist might determine that T, U, V, W, X, Y, and Z all belong in genus A. Agreement on circumscriptions is not governed by the Codes of Zoological or Botanical Nomenclature, and must be reached by scientific consensus. A goal of biological taxonomy is to achieve a stable circumscription for every taxon. This goal conflicts, at times, with the goal of achieving a natural classification that reflects the evolutionary history of divergence of groups of organisms. Balancing these two goals is a work in progress, and the circumscriptions of many taxa that had been regarded as stable for decades are in upheaval in the light of rapid developments in molecu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Molecular Phylogenetics
Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to determine the processes by which diversity among species has been achieved. The result of a molecular phylogenetics, phylogenetic analysis is expressed in a phylogenetic tree. Molecular phylogenetics is one aspect of molecular systematics, a broader term that also includes the use of molecular data in Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy and biogeography. Molecular phylogenetics and molecular evolution correlate. Molecular evolution is the process of selective changes (mutations) at a molecular level (genes, proteins, etc.) throughout various branches in the tree of life (evolution). Molecular phylogenetics makes inferences of the evolutionary relationships that arise due to molecular evolution and results in the construction of a phylogenetic tre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Ocean; to the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe; to the east and northeast by Mozambique and Eswatini; and it encloses Lesotho. Covering an area of , the country has Demographics of South Africa, a population of over 64 million people. Pretoria is the administrative capital, while Cape Town, as the seat of Parliament of South Africa, Parliament, is the legislative capital, and Bloemfontein is regarded as the judicial capital. The largest, most populous city is Johannesburg, followed by Cape Town and Durban. Cradle of Humankind, Archaeological findings suggest that various hominid species existed in South Africa about 2.5 million years ago, and modern humans inhabited the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
