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Loranthaceae, commonly known as the showy mistletoes, 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 ...
of
flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (). The term angiosperm is derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek words (; 'container, vessel') and (; 'seed'), meaning that the seeds are enclosed with ...
s. It consists of about 75 genera and 1,000 species of
woody plant A woody plant is a plant that produces wood as its structural tissue and thus has a hard stem. In cold climates, woody plants further survive winter or dry season above ground, as opposed to Herbaceous plant, herbaceous plants that die back to t ...
s, many of them hemiparasites. The three terrestrial species are '' Nuytsia floribunda'' (the Western Australian Christmas tree), '' Atkinsonia ligustrina'' (from the Blue Mountains of Australia), and '' Gaiadendron punctatum'' (from Central/South America.) Loranthaceae are primarily
xylem Xylem is one of the two types of transport tissue (biology), tissue in vascular plants, the other being phloem; both of these are part of the vascular bundle. The basic function of the xylem is to transport water upward from the roots to parts o ...
parasites, but their haustoria may sometimes tap the
phloem Phloem (, ) is the living tissue in vascular plants that transports the soluble organic compounds made during photosynthesis and known as ''photosynthates'', in particular the sugar sucrose, to the rest of the plant. This transport process is ...
, while '' Tristerix aphyllus'' is almost holoparasitic. For a more complete description of the Australian Loranthaceae, se
Flora of Australia online
., for the Malesian Loranthaceae se
Flora of Malesia
Originally, Loranthaceae contained all
mistletoe Mistletoe is the common name for obligate parasite, obligate parasitic plant, hemiparasitic plants in the Order (biology), order Santalales. They are attached to their host tree or shrub by a structure called the haustorium, through which they ...
species, but the mistletoes of Europe and North America ('' Viscum'', ''
Arceuthobium The genus ''Arceuthobium'', commonly called dwarf mistletoes, is a genus of 42 species of parasitic plants that parasitize members of Pinaceae and Cupressaceae in North America, Central America, Asia, Europe, and Africa. Of the 42 species that h ...
'', and '' Phoradendron'') belong to the family Santalaceae. The APG II system 2003 assigns the family to the order Santalales in the clade core eudicots.


Phylogeny

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 ...
suggests the following relationships of tribes, subtribes and genera: '' Nuytsia'' is sister to the rest of the Loranthaceae, with many characters, including its pollen, its fruit (dry and three winged), and the number of its
cotyledons A cotyledon ( ; ; "a cavity, small cup, any cup-shaped hollow", gen. (), ) is a "seed leaf" – a significant part of the embryo within the seed of a plant – and is formally defined as "the embryonic leaf in seed-bearing plants, one or mor ...
, differing substantially from all other Loranthaceae genera. The root parasitic habit is thought to be the basal condition of the family., with the stem/branch parasitic habit evolving ca. 28-40 million years ago. However, Grimsson ''et al.'' (2017) estimate this as occurring somewhat earlier (ca. 40-52 million years ago).


Genera

78 genera are accepted:Loranthaceae Juss.
''
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 i ...
''. Retrieved 6 December 2023.


See also

*
Parasitic plant A parasitic plant is a plant that derives some or all of its nutritional requirements from another living plant. They make up about 1% of angiosperms and are found in almost every biome. All Parasite, parasitic plants develop a specialized organ ...


References


External links

*
Loranthaceae on the Parasitic Plant Connection web siteChilean Loranthaceae
at Chileflora {{Authority control Eudicot families