Characiaceae is a

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

green algae The green algae (: green alga) are a group of chlorophyll-containing autotrophic eukaryotes consisting of the phylum Prasinodermophyta and its unnamed sister group that contains the Chlorophyta and Charophyta/ Streptophyta. The land plants ...

in the order

Sphaeropleales Sphaeropleales is an order of green algae that used to be called Chlorococcales. The order includes some of the most common freshwater plankton Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms that drift in Hydrosphere, water (or atmosphe ...

. It contains epiphytic or

planktonic Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms that drift in water (or air) but are unable to actively propel themselves against currents (or wind). The individual organisms constituting plankton are called plankters. In the ocean, they pro ...

algae that are unicellular or colonial. The cells are heteropolar, with basal and apical ends having different shapes. The daughter cells are often retained in the cell wall of the old mother cell, whose cell wall becomes gelatinized.

Taxonomy

The taxonomy of Characiaceae has undergone significant revision in the last century. Characiaceae once included genera such as '' Schroederia'', but that circumscription made the family

polyphyletic A polyphyletic group is an assemblage that includes organisms with mixed evolutionary origin but does not include their most recent common ancestor. The term is often applied to groups that share similar features known as Homoplasy, homoplasies ...

, so many of those genera have been transferred to other families. However, the taxonomic affiliation of the type species of the genus ''Characium'' (''C. sieboldii'') is still unclear, which necessitates further revision of the family. ,

AlgaeBase AlgaeBase is a global species database of information on all groups of algae, both seaweed, marine and freshwater algae, freshwater, as well as sea-grass. History AlgaeBase began in March 1996, founded by Michael D. Guiry, Michael Guiry. Text ...

accepted the following genera: *'' Acrochasma'' Korshikov – 1 species *'' Actidesmium'' Reinsch – 2 species *'' Bicuspidellopsis'' Korshikov – 1 species *'' Characiella'' Schmidle – 1 species *'' Characiellopsis'' M.O.P.Iyengar – 2 species *'' Characium'' A. Braun – 51 species *'' Craniocystis'' – 1 species *'' Deuterocharacium'' Petrý – 2 species *'' Korshikoviella'' P.C.Silva – 5 species *'' Lambertia'' Korshikov – 1 species *'' Lanceola'' F.Hindák – 1 species *'' Marthea'' Pascher – 1 species *'' Pseudoschroederia'' Hegewald & Schnepf – 3 species

References

Chlorophyceae families Sphaeropleales {{Chlorophyceae-stub