Monocots I: General Alismatids & Lilioids
Introduction
Monocotyledons include some 75,000 species in 97 families, approximately a quarter of all flowering plants. They dominate significant parts of world ecosystems, and are of immense economic importance, including the staple grass food crops (wheat, barley, rice and maize) and other important food plants such as onions, palms, yams, bananas and gingers. Many monocots produce secondary metabolites that have pharmaceutical and agrochemical properties. Others are important in horticulture, especially daffodils, lilies, irises, hyacinths, orchids, colchicums, bromeliads, aroids, palms, grasses and sedges.
Alismatid monocots, which are an early-divergent monocot lineage, span two orders: Alismatales (16 families, including Alismataceae, Araceae, Potamogetonaceae, Tofieldiaceae) and Acorales (Acorus). Lilioid monocots encompass all other non-commelinid monocots. These represent the orders Asparagales (29 families, including Agavaceae, Alliaceae, Amaryllidaceae, Asparagaceae, Asphodelaceae, Hypoxidaceae, Iridaceae, Orchidaceae), Liliales (11 families, including Alstroemeriaceae, Colchicaceae, Liliaceae, Melanthiaceae, Smilacaceae), Dioscoreales (three families: Burmanniaceae, Dioscoreaceae sensu lato, Nartheciaceae), Pandanales (five families: Cyclanthaceae, Pandanaceae, Stemonaceae, Triuridaceae, Velloziaceae) and Petrosaviales (Japonolirion and Petrosavia).
Monocots have long formed a major focal area for Kew's research, in the Herbarium, HPE and Jodrell Laboratory. Kew organised the first international monocot conference in 1993, and later published the proceedings volumes Monocotyledons: Systematics and Evolution (Rudall, Cribb, Cutler and Humphries [eds], Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, 1995). This timely conference, which coincided with the molecular phylogenetic revolution, initiated a series of highly influential international conferences (Sydney 1998, California 2003, planned Copenhagen 2008) which led into subsequent diverse research areas.
The Kew Monocot programme is currently subdivided into three cross-departmental teams (I: general, alismatids and lilioids; II: commelinids; and III: orchids). It encompasses economic botany, tropical and temperate floras, monographs, revisions and evolutionary studies at all taxonomic levels. A wide range of data is utilised, including morphology, anatomy, biochemistry, palynology, cytogenetics and genetics. The major objective for the Monocot programme is to maintain and develop Kew’s systematic and phylogenetic research and expertise so that we remain a world leader in monocot systematics. We also aim to develop expertise, information and products that are useful in conservation and sustainable development of monocots in their natural habitats.