The Plant Press

Art by Alice Tangerini: Vitis californica Benth.

From Plant Press, Vol. 27, No. 1, January 2024.

California grape is a unique western North American species native to central and northern California and southern Oregon. Recent genomic analyses suggest its ancient hybrid origin involves a maternal extinct parent species that may have given rise to the large speciose Eurasian clade of Vitis.  The leaves of California grape turn beautiful orange and yellow in the fall and the purple fruits are edible but sour.  Many populations of V. californica in the California wine region have hybridized with the wine grape V. vinifera as suggested by the featured article by Nie et al. (2023) in this issue of The Plant Press. The illustration displayed here was based on living cut collections brought by Jun Wen after a trip to Chico, California, in addition to herbarium specimens. One specimen was a collection by USDA illustrator Frederick A. Walpole from 1899. A note on the specimen mentioned a drawing done by Walpole. Alice Tangerini was able to locate the drawing at the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation, Carnegie Mellon University, and it was listed as an indefinite loan from the Smithsonian. A scan of the illustration appears on the Hunt website, and it supplied additional information about flower details. Tangerini’s illustration appears in Flora of North America North of Mexico, Vol. 12 – Magnoliophyta: Vitaceae to Garryaceae.

Staff activities

From Plant Press, Vol. 27, No. 1, January 2024.

Smithsonian Botany postdoctoral fellow, Alicia Talavera, shared research on North American grapes during a bilingual 'Expert Is In' session in the Hall of Mammals at the National Museum of Natural History on Friday, December 29. She aimed to convey these key messages to the visitors: (1) Natural history museums play a vital role in discovering new species, providing crucial information for understanding and protecting nature, and enhancing our crops and food; and (2) Technological advancements allow us to extract abundant information from specimens in museums. This essential information helps us understand grape diversity, and enables us to adapt and improve cultivars in response to new challenges like climate change, and for the conservation of nature.

Botany postdoctoral fellow, Alicia Talavera, shares research on grape diversity at an Expert Is In session in the Hall of Mammals, NMNH. (photo by Arthur H. Earle)

Jun Wen visited the production facility of the United States Botanic Garden on December 12 to check the Tetrastigma (Vitaceae) living collections. Tetrastigma species are host plants of parasitic Rafflesia (Rafflesiaceae), which have the largest flowers in the world.

Travel award recipients visit Smithsonian

From Plant Press, Vol. 27, No. 1, January 2024.

Igor Azevedo is a 2020 José Cuatrecasas Fellow studying the taxonomy of Trichantherinae (Acanthaceae).

Igor Azevedo, a post-doctoral researcher from Universidade Federal do Mato Grosso, Cuiabá, Brazil, is studying the taxonomy of Acanthaceae. He has been working on this family since the beginning of his undergraduate career, and now his research focuses on revising the taxonomy, phylogeny, and biogeography of members of Trichantherinae, a Neotropical subtribe with six genera and about 80 species distributed from the Amazon to Mexico. The U.S. National Herbarium houses a great number of collections of this group including more than half of its type specimens. Consulting the collection was essential to finish the first part of his taxonomic revision of the genus Sanchezia. During an October 2023 visit to the herbarium as a 2020 José Cuatrecasas Fellow, he was able to confirm at least 10 new species, which are now being prepared for publication. The correct identification of the collections of Trichantherinae species is also highly important for the next steps of his project, especially the biogeography, in which he will evaluate both the geographic distribution of the species and their evolution associated with the paleohistory of their habitats.

Liris Barbosa is a 2023 José Cuatrecasas Fellow studying the taxonomy of Bidens (Coreopsideae, Asteraceae).

Maria Liris Barbosa de Silva, a Brazilian PhD student in Botany at Programa de Pós-Graduação em Botânica, da Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana (PPGBOT-UEFS) is a 2023 José Cuatrecasas Fellow. Her thesis aims to produce a molecular phylogeny of the genus Bidens (Coreopsideae, Asteraceae) focusing on the pantropical clade and conduct a taxonomic study of Brazilian species within the genus. During her visit to the United States National Herbarium, she was able to analyze the morphology of specimens of Bidens from Africa, Central and South America, as well as the Pacific Islands, including type materials of Bidens species that occur in these areas. She acquired 19 samples of 14 species for DNA extraction, improving her sampling of the pantropical species. Her morphological analysis and the new DNA samples acquired will contribute to the overall understanding of the taxonomic and evolutionary relationships within the genus.

Florencia Dosil, the 2023 Robinson & Funk Fellow, is working on a systematic revision, phylogeny, and biogeography of the Neotropical species of Adenostemma (Eupatorieae, Asteraceae). She is a doctoral student from Museo de La Plata, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Argentina, and she visited the herbarium from October to November.