全 文 ：植 物 分 类 学 报 43(1): 82–93(2005)
Acta Phytotaxonomica Sinica
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Received: 27 July 2004 Accepted: 29 November 2004
* Author for correspondence. Address: Sichuan Agricultural University, Ya’an, Sichuan 625014, China. Tel.: 86-835-2242404;
E-mail: .

·Review·
Hitoshi Kihara, Áskell Löve and the modern genetic
concept of the genera in the tribe
Triticeae (Poaceae)
1YEN Chi* 1YANG Jun-Liang 2YEN Yang
1(Triticeae Research Institute, Sichuan Agricultural University, Dujiangyan, Sichuan 611830, China)
2(Department of Biology and Microbiology, South Dakota State University, Brookings, SD 57006, USA)
Abstract Taxonomy is a tool for organism recognition, an understanding of phylogenetic
relationships among organisms, a guide for germplasm utilization, and a common language for
communication. Therefore, a taxonomic treatment needs to reflect our current understanding
of such relationships. In nature, there are only two absolute units of living organisms:
individuals and species. A species is a group of individuals who are connected to each other as
a unit by their indispensable relationships of breeding. Reproductive separation is an essential
boundary between species, and the only factor to form independent gene pools during
organismal evolution. Since there is no absolute boundary among taxa above species, any
taxonomic treatments above species cannot avoid arbitrariness. Nevertheless, some
classification should be made for the convenience of their description, utility and/or study.
This paper classifies the biosystematic relationships among taxa in Triticeae on the basis of
genetic studies. The principles for our taxonomic treatment are: (1) reflecting the current
understanding of the phylogeny among the species involved, (2) being convenient for
germplasm utilization, and (3) avoiding unnecessary radical change apart from the tradition.
Key words Taxonomy, genus, classification principle, biosystematics, genome.

Taxonomy is a tool for organism recognition. It tells us which species an individual
belongs to as well as how it is related to others. Taxonomy is also a guide for germplasm
utilization. People use it to identify the adequate gene pool. Therefore, a taxonomic treatment
needs to reflect the current understanding of such relationships based on multidisciplinary
researches, and yet be convenient for using.
Triticeae is economically the most important tribe in Poaceae. It contains major cereal
crops and forage grasses such as wheat, barley and rye. Because of their economic importance,
Triticeae plants are far more frequently used for applied and theoretical researches than any
other tribes of the Poaceae are. However, confusions have often arisen about which species the
authors were talking about due to variety of taxonomic classification systems followed by
different authors. Hence, a taxonomic treatment that reflects our current understanding of the
phylogenetic relationship is needed to be adapted so that we can have a common language
when talking about Triticeae plants.
1 Historical account and current situation in Triticeae taxonomy
From the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries, Triticeae taxonomy was basically based
on morphological and phytogeographic studies. Binary nomenclature of species, systematic
No. 1 YEN Chi et al.: Modern genetic concept of the genera in Triticeae 83
ranks, and International Code of Botanical Nomenclature were established during this period.
These achievements have helped to resolve the chaos in plant recognition by arranging
individuals into systematic ranks. Now, it is well known that morphological characters are
phenotypes of the individuals directed by their genetic make-ups. It is also known that
phenotypes result from the interactions among environmental and hereditary factors.
Morphologic similarities may reflect a close phylogenetic relationship among individuals.
However, two phylogenetically closely related species can also be morphologically different to
each other when they grow up in different environments. Thus, a taxonomic treatment solely
relying on morphological analysis cannot avoid misclassification.
Following the pioneer work by Rosenberg (1909), Kihara (1930) proposed his genome
theory and introduced his cytogenetic method for studying the phylogenetic relationships
among species and genera in higher plants. He brilliantly expounded the origin of auto- and
allo-polyploids. He made a clear classification of the genus Aegilops L. He also clarified the
origin and the relationships among species of the genus Triticum. Since then, genetic studies
and, particularly, cytogenetic studies have strongly influenced taxonomic treatments of
Triticeae species. Examples are the taxonomic treatments by Sears (1948, 1956), Mac Key
(1954, 1963, 1968a, b), Bowden (1959), and Morris and Sears (1967). Dewey and his
colleagues (Dewey 1967a, b, 1968a, b, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1981; Dewey & Holmgren,
1962) carried out cytogenetic studies in perennial Triticeae grasses for many years and made
great contributions to the basic knowledge of the genomic constitutions in most plants of this
group (Dewey, 1982, 1984). These achievements created a favorable environment for
developing cytotaxonomy of tribe Triticeae, and prompted Löve (1982) to propose his generic
taxonomy of tribe Triticeae on the basis of his rigorously genomic concept by recommending
that each genome (or haplome as he called) or combination should be the base to define a
genus. His “Conspectus of the Triticeae” (Löve, 1984), as he said, is “a taxonomical and
nomenclatural survey of the more than 500 biological taxa of the Triticeae tribe of grasses in a
system of thirty-seven genomically defined genera based on twenty-three single-haplome taxa
as recently validated elsewhere”. He regarded the genomic approach as being “crucial for
studies of the evolution and definition of the basic taxonomical categories” (Löve, 1984).
We generally agree with Löve’s viewpoint that “genome analysis that identifies haplomes has
become widely accepted as a method for studies of polyploids and their ancestry”. However,
we also recognize that some species on Löve’s list had never been cytogenetically studied at
that time. Many of these species are Asiatic perennial species. The treatment of the group that
is traditionally classified as the genus Roegneria is a good example. The Y genome in these
plants was not well studied at that time. Hence he treated Roegneria as a synonym of Elymus.
Although many scientists have favored Löve’s conspectus of Triticeae (Bothmer &
Salomon, 1994; Lu, 1994), nobody has exactly abided by his principles. For example, he
divided Aegilops-Triticum group into 16 genera. So far, Aegilops or Triticum has still been a
favorite as the genus name for this group. Most botanists in Europe and North America deviate
from Löve’s principles and put six genomic combinations into one genus, the Elymus sensu
lato. Löve put these taxa together into the genus Elymus due to his limited knowledge of their
genomic constitutions in his era. Now, we have known that these groups consist of multiple
genomes and need to be further divided if Löve’s principle is followed. However, those
botanists who believe they are Löve’s followers still unfortunately follow Löve’s unadvisable
classification and ignore his essential principles of generic definition.
As Yen et al. (1997) pointed out, there are only two absolute units of living organisms in
nature: individuals and species. A species is a group of individuals who are connected to each
other by their indispensable relationships of breeding. No absolute boundary exists among
genera, families and the taxa above. Taxonomic treatment above species cannot avoid
Acta Phytotaxonomica Sinica Vol. 43 84
arbitrariness. Classification at genus level can be made on different bases. For example, the
genus Triticum L. was defined as having the A, B and D genome combination (Löve, 1984),
possessing an A genome (Kihara, 1954, 1982; Mac Key, 1963, 1968a, b), or having close
genomic relationships (Morris & Sears, 1967; Kimber & Feldman, 1987).
Species is very important in theoretical and applied biology. This is because that a species
represents an independent gene pool in the evolutionary system. Reproductive separation is
the only factor for the formation of such independent gene pools in organismal evolution.
Although there are many concepts about how to define a species, from the viewpoint of
evolutionary genetics, a species is an independent gene pool, and reproductive separation is
the only standard for species identification. The factor(s) causing the reproductive separation
is the causal force of speciation. How the reproductive separation has been achieved,
however, varies among species. It may be caused by a gene mutation, such as the rDNA
mutation that separates Triticum monococcum L. and T. urartu Thumanjan ex Gandilyan; by
an chromosomal aberration, such as the translocation between Secale montanum Guss. and S.
cereale L.; or by a genomic convergence, such as in the origin of Triticum timopheevi Zhuk.,
an amphidiploid derived from the hybrid between T. urartu and T. speltoides Flaksb. From
these, we can see that reproductive separation might be achieved at different levels of genetic
constitution, such as being genic, chromosomal or genomic, but the result is the same.
Formation of reproductive isolation is the pathway by which each species has evolved, and it
may differ one species from others. Therefore, the fact that speciation has followed multiple
routes in the nature needs to be kept in mind when we do taxonomic treatment. Obviously, it
will be wrong to use a single uniformed formula to classify a group of diverse species such as
Triticeae species. And this is the exact mistake made by Löve (1984).
Plant taxonomy is a science dealing with classification of plants for facilitating their
utility for human benefits. Although we hope that a taxonomic treatment can truly reflect the
natural relationships of the taxa concerned, it also should be convenient for utilization. If a
taxonomic classification goes too extreme, resulting in too many monotypic genera or too
many species in one giant genus, it will become useless. The treatment of Aegilops-Triticum
complex of Löve (1984) and the treatment of the genus Elymus by some others just represent
such a mistake.
2 The major problems of Triticeae taxonomy
One of the hot disputes in the genus classification in Triticeae is the treatment of the
genera Elymus and Roegneria. These perennial grasses are naturally divided into several
groups according to cytogenetic studies, molecular analyses, phytogeographic observations,
and ecological and morphological survey. These natural groups were validly identified as
several genera based on the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature. One of them is the
genus Roegneria, which was established on the basis of the type species Roegneria caucasica
C. Koch and based upon priority of publication (Koch, 1848 in Linnaea 21: 413).
Phytogeographically, this group of plants has their own special distribution area.
Morphologically, they have short and broader palea. Hence, Roegneria should be a valid
genus according to the Code. Cytogenetically, these species possess St and Y genomes (Jensen
& Wang, 1991; Lu, 1993), unlike Elymus sibiricus L., the type species of the genus Elymus,
which has an St and H genome combination (Dewey, 1974). If we follow Löve’s principles,
Roegneria should also be a genus.
The so-called genus Elymus recognized by many botanists is in fact a medley of various
combinations of the H, P, St, W and Y genomes (Bothmer & Salomon, 1994). If we follow
the genomic group concept which Morris and Sears (1967) applied to genus Triticum, the
No. 1 YEN Chi et al.: Modern genetic concept of the genera in Triticeae 85
genus Elymus sensu lato should include the diploid related taxa as well. Hence, Agropyron,
Australopyrum (Tzvelev) Á. Löve, Hordeum section Campestria, and Pseudoroegneria should
be grouped into this genus, and Elymus would be a giant genus, with more than 200 species!
This genus still would have more than 150 species even if the diploid taxa were excluded.
Jensen (1996) proved that genomes P, St and Y were possessed by E. alatavicus
(Drobov) Á. Löve, E. batalinii (Krasn.) Á. Löve, E. grandiglumis (Keng) Á. Löve, E. kengii
(Tzvelev) D. F. Cui, E. kokonoricus (Keng) Á. Löve, E. melantherus (Keng) Á. Löve and E.
thoroldianus (Oliver) G. Singh. And, he combined these species into section Hyalolepis
(Nevski) Á. Löve of the genus Elymus. Also, the genus Elymus proposed by Bothmer and
Salomon (1994) and Lu (1994) is composed of more than 150 taxa. They all claimed that they
followed Löve. As mentioned above, a taxonomic treatment above the species level cannot
avoid arbitrariness. If there exist natural groups we should embody them into our
classification. The genus Elymus of Löve’s needs to be revised to embody the natural groups
indicated by cytological, morphological and eco-phytogeographical surveys on the basis of the
International Code of Botanical Nomenclature. And we can do so by just following Löve’s
principles. Figure 2 shows such a treatment. Of the taxa, Australoroegneria (StStWWYY,
Torabinejad & Mueller, 1993), and Douglasdeweya (PPStSt, Wang et al., 1986 ) are newly
established genera.
Some natural groups were formed by ecological condition, and have some distinguished
morphological characteristics for adaptation. For example, Hystrix Moench is a disputed
group. It has broadly lanceolate leaves to adapt the dim sun light under forests and reduced
glumes. Based on their preliminary cytological observation, Church (1967a, b) and Dewey
(1982, 1984) believed that this group of species had the same H and St genomes as Elymus
and Sitanion Raf. So, Löve (1984) put both Sitanion and Hystrix species into Elymus as
section Hystrix (Moech) Á. Löve, and section Sitanion (Rsfin.) Á. Löve, respectively.
However, recent molecular analyses (Jensen & Wang, 1997; Zhou et al., 1999; Zhou et al.,
2000; Zhang et al., 2002) showed that Hystrix californica Kuntze, Hystrix duthiei (Stapf) Bor,
Hystrix duthiei ssp. longearistata (Hack.) C. Baden and Hystrix coreana (Honda) Ohwi do not
have the H and St genomes, but the Ns and Xm genomes. As a result, these Hystrix species
should belong to the genus Leymus Hochst. (Jensen & Wang, 1997; Svitashev et al., 1998) and
should thus be reclassified as a section under the genus Leymus. On the other hand, Hystrix
patula Moench morphologically looks like H. duthiei ssp. longearistata very much. However,
recent cytogenetic study suggested that these two forest grasses share no genome with each
other (Hai-Qin ZHANG, personal communication), and thus cannot be classified in the same
genus. Obviously, Hystrix can no longer be recognized as an independent genus.
According to the traditional, morphological treatment, the genus Hordeum consists of 37
species. Löve (1984) separated Critesion Rafin. from Hordeum. From the viewpoint of
cytotaxonomy, this treatment is right, but few people follow this treatment in practice because
of the force of habit. Recent researches (Bothmer et al., 1986, 1987, 1988a, b; Jaaska, 1992,
1994) suggested that two groups in the genus Critesion, namely H. murinum L. (=section
Trichostachys (Dumortier) Á. Löve) and Hordeum marinum Huds. (=section Marina) are
different from other Critesion species. These species have an Xu or an Xa genome,
respectively. Their crossibility with Critesion species is very low, and chromosome pairing has
not been observed in the hybrids. All these indicated that these two groups of species have no
close phylogenetic relationships with other taxa of Hordeum or Critesion. Based on Löve’s
principles, these two groups must be treated as separate genera: Trichostachys and Marina, in
addition to Hordeum and Critesion. If we consider the force of habit, they would better be
treated as sections, or subgenera under Hordeum instead.
Another problem in these taxa is the existence of chromosome pairing control genes
Acta Phytotaxonomica Sinica Vol. 43 86
(Sadasivaiah & Kasha, 1971; Yen & Yang, 2004). The action of such genes overshadows the
real phylogenetic distance between Hordeum vulgare L. and H. nodosum L. Their hybrids
were found to have seven ring bivalents at MI of the pollen mother cells but quite sterile.
Chromosomes from H. nodosum L. were often eliminated after several cell cycles. It seems
that the two taxa share the same I genome (Dewey, 1984), but differentiation did occur.
Therefore, we propose here to designate the genome of H. nodosum as the In. Obviously, this
taxon should belong to Hordeum but not a member of Critesion.
Löve (1984) divided traditional Elytrigia Desv. into three genera: Lophopyrum,
Thinopyrum Á. Löve, and Elytrigia. Recent investigations (Wang, 1985; Liu & Wang, 1989,
1992, 1993a, b; Xu & Conner, 1994) indicated that genome J is very close to genome E, and
the two can be regarded as two modified forms of the later and thus designated as Eb and Ee,
respectively (Wang et al., 1994). Since Thinopyrum and Lophopyrum have the same basic
genome, these two genera should, according to Löve’s principles, be combined. Elytrigia
repens (L.) Nevski (the type species of the genus Elytrigia) was observed to have the StStH
genome combination (Dewey, 1980; Assadi, 1994; Assadi & Runemark, 1995; Vershinin et al.,
1994), and thus should be combined into genus Elymus. Elytrigia section Trichophorae has
been found to possess an EeSt, EeEeSt or EbEeSt combinations. If Löve’s principles are
followed, this taxon should be raised to the genus level and, together with Thinopyrum and
Lophopyrum, designated as a new genus Trichopyrum Á. Löve. Figure 1 shows the
phylogenetic relationships of these groups.

Fig. 1. A diagram of phylogenetic relationships of Lophopyrum group and their genomic donors.

The Aegilops-Triticum group is special because that it consists of only about 28 species
but has eight different genomes plus more than five modified versions. Every diploid taxon
has its own genome. These diploid species are very easy to cross with each other resulting in
many allo- or auto-allopolyploid species. Löve (1984) divided this group into 16 genera, with
10 being monotypic. Nevertheless, the great majority of wheat scientists have never accepted
Löve’s treatment. Instead, Aegilops or Triticum is still used as the generic name for these taxa.
Aegilops mutica Boiss. has a T genome, which has never been found in any polyploidy
species. It seems that this species has no close phylogenetic relationship with other Aegilops
taxa. In fact, Eig (1929) separated this taxon from Aegilops and treated it as a genus,
Amblyopyrum Eig. Obviously, Eig’s treatment seems to reflect the phylogenetic relationships
No. 1 YEN Chi et al.: Modern genetic concept of the genera in Triticeae 87
and follow the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature. Amblyopyrum, therefore, ought
to be a valid genus name. Hence, A. muticum (Boiss.) Eig is undoubtedly a valid species name
for this taxon. Löve (1984) and Tzvelev (1989) followed Eig’s suit and we fully agree with
them.

Fig. 2. A diagram of phylogenetic relationships among genera Agropyron, Australopyrum, Australoroegneria, Elymus,
Hordeum, Kengyilia, Campeiostachys, Douglasdeweya, Pseudoroegneria, and Roegneria.

According to Kihara (1930, 1954), whether the uniqueness of a genome in a diploid
species is defined by the degree of its difference from other genomic analysers is judged by
chromosome pairing in meiosis of the hybrids. However, there is no consistent standard for
this judgement. For example, although genome B of the Triticum species obviously has some
differences from genomes G and S, Löve still designated B for the latter two. Certainly, the
differences among the B, G, and S genomes may not be as great as those among the Sb
genome of Aegilops bicornis Jaub. & Spach., the Sl genome of Ae. longissima Schweinf. &
Muschl., and the Ss genome of Ae. searsii Feldman & Kislev ex Hammer. Are they qualified
to be independent genomes or only modified versions of B genome? There has been no clear
answer. Tsunewaki (1988) showed that T. timopheevi shared its cytoplasm with Ae. speltoides
Tausch, and thus proved that the G genome of T. timopheevi has very closely relationship to
the S genome of Ae. speltoides.
Yen and Kimber (1990) used the variable loge(x/y) to measure of the genomic distance
among the S-genome groups (Fig. 3). The results showed that Aegilops longissima and Ae.
speltoides have the most distant relationship; that Ae. sharonensis Eig. is equally and most
closely related to Ae. longissima and Ae. speltoides; that Ae. bicornis is closer to Ae. speltoides


Fig. 3. The variable relationships among the S-genome of diploid Aegilops species, measured by loge(x/y). (From Yen &
Kimber, 1990)
Acta Phytotaxonomica Sinica Vol. 43 88
than to any other species and almost equally but closely related to Ae. longissima, Ae.
sharonensis and Ae. searsii; and that Ae. searsii is almost equally but distantly related to Ae.
longissima, Ae. speltoides and Ae. bicornis. These results suggested that the S-genome species
share a same basic genome but each has a unique variety.
Results of molecular analyses have also shown that genomes S, B, D, and A are much
more closely related to each other than to other genomes (Monte et al., 1993; Dvorak &
Zhang, 1990; Dvorak et al., 1998). Molecular analyses of cytoplasm genomes reported by
Tsunewaki (1996) suggested that Triticum timopheevi has the same cytoplasm as some races
of Aegilops speltoides do and the cytoplasm of T. turgidum L. is very similar to that in some
races of Ae. speltoides. All these suggested that genomes S, B and G are basically the same
genome. Therefore, Löve was right when he applied the genome symbol “B” to all of these
modified versions previously designated as S, G and B, respectively. On the other hand, the
International Committee on Genome Designation of International Triticeae Symposium kept
the traditional designations for the corresponding genomes in its “Genome Symbols in the
Triticeae (Poaceae)” (published in 1994, Logan, Utah, U.S.A.). This is a good example
showing that designating a genome symbol is very arbitrary and is strongly influenced by the
force of habit. Although the suggestion by the International Committee on Genome
Designations of the Second International Triticeae Symposium will be followed here, we,
considering their real phylogenetic distances, still regard genomes B, G, and S just as different
versions of the same genome. Hence Fig. 4 shows the relationships among the taxa within the
Aegilops-Triticum group.
As shown in Fig. 4, Aegilops-Triticum species have been basically formed around three
pivotal genomes, A, D, and U. Phylogenetically, speciation in this group is quite different
from that in the St genomic groups (Elymus-Kengyilia-Roegneria ... etc.). Speciation in the St
genomic groups is mainly based on genomic modification. For example, 23 species and five
varieties in the genus Kengyilia share the same basic genome combination but differ by minor

Fig. 4. A diagram of phylogenetic relationships within the genus Triticum.

No. 1 YEN Chi et al.: Modern genetic concept of the genera in Triticeae 89
modifications; and so is the speciation in the genera Elymus, Campeiostachys and Roegneria.
Now we are in a scenario that Löve’s rigorous genome concept of classification is suitable for
the St taxa but not for the A, D, and U taxa. If we applied Löve’s concept to the A, D, and U
taxa,we can not avoid making too many monotypic genera in the classification.
Philosophically, things will go to their opposite if they are too extreme. Krause (1898)
combined Elymus, Hordeum, Elytrigia (=Agropyron), Secale L., and Triticum together and
established a giant genus, Frumentum Krause. On the other hand, Löve classified 11
monotypic genera for the Aegilops-Triticum group. Practically, nobody but themselves have
accepted these extreme treatments no matter how good the reasons did they have.
The proposed classification of the genera in Triticeae
Obviously, a new classification of Triticeae species at the genus level is badly needed to
clear up the chaos. Here, we propose the following principles for the genus classification:
(1) A treatment of genera should reflect not only the phylogenetic relationships among
the species involved, but also the convenience of its applications.
(2) Genus treatment must follow the principles and articles of the International Code of
Botanical Nomenclature.
(3) The force of habit needs to be considered whenever possible to avoid adding more
chaos.
(4) Since speciation of different species group may follow different pathways, different
standards should be applied to their classification to better reflect their phylogeny.
(5) Nuclear and cytoplasmic genome constitutions are important factors for the genus
classification and so are ecological factors.
(6) A genus classification needs to be revised if more knowledge about the phylogenesis
is obtained.
As we mentioned above, Triticeae taxonomy was first established on the basis of
morphology, phytogeography and ecology before the era of experimental sciences.
Nevertheless, morphological taxonomy can only serve as the first step to approach a taxon.
The preliminary morphological taxonomy has to be revised if adequate data from experimental
sciences are available. We consider that we now have the adequate data to revise the taxonomy
of the tribe Triticeae at the genus level and mostly at species level. With Löve’s conspectus in
mind and on the basis of the principles we proposed above, we herewith propose the following
generic reclassification of the tribe Triticeae:
1. Hordeum and its sections
Hordeum L., Sp. Pl.: 84. 1753.
Section Cerealia Anderson, Skand. Gram.: 8. 1852.
Genome: I and its modified versions.
Section Trichostachys Dumortier, Observ. Gram. Belg.: 92. 1823.
Genome: Xu and its modified versions.
Section Marina (Nevski) Jaaska in Hereditas 116: 30. 1992.
Genome: Xa and its modified versions.
Section Campestria Anderson, Skand. Gram.: 8. 1852.
Genome: H and its modified versions.
2. Lophopyrum
Lophopyrum Á. Löve in Taxon 29: 351. 1980.
Section Lophopyrum
Genome: Ee, Eb.
Section Trichophorae (Nevski) Dubovik in Nov. Sist. Vyssch. Nizschikh Rast. 1976:
Acta Phytotaxonomica Sinica Vol. 43 90
7. 1977.
Genome: St, Ee, Eb.
3. Elymus and the related genera
Agropyron J. Gaertn. in Nov. Comm. Acad. Sci. Petrop. 14: 539. 1770.
Genome: P.
Hordeum L., Sp. Pl.:84. 1753.
Section Campestria Anderson, Skand. Gram.: 8. 1852.
Genome: H.
Australopyrum (Tzvelev) Á. Löve in Feddes Repert. 95: 442. 1984.
Genome: W.
Pseudoroegeria (Nevski) Á. Löve in Taxon 29: 168. 1980.
Genome: St.
Elymus L., Sp. Pl.: 83. 1753.
Genome: H, St.
Roegneria C. Koch in Linnaea 21: 413. 1848.
Genome: St, Y.
Campeiostacgys Drob., Fl. Uzbek. 1: 540. 1941.
Genome: H, St, Y.
Kengyilia C. Yen & J. L. Yang in Can. J. Bot. 68: 1894-1897. 1990.
Genome: P, St, Y.
Douglasdeweya C. Yen, J. L. Yang & D. Q. Baum in Can. J. Bot. 2005 (in press).
Genome: P, St.
Australoroegneria C. Yen & J. L. Yang (ined.).
Genome: St, W, Y.
4. Aegilops-Triticum complex
Triticum L., Sp. Pl. : 85. 1753.
Subgenus Aegilops Hackel in Engler & Prantl, Nat. Pflanzenfam. II : 80. 1887.
Genome: D, Dc; C; M (Xc, Xt), Mo; N; U.
Subgenus Sitopyros Hackel in Engler & Prantl, Nat. Pflanzenfam. II : 81. 1887.
Genome: A, Am; B, Bsp, Bl, Bb, Bs; D.
We understand that this reclassification does not solve all the problems we have. Some
problems, such as the treatment of the taxa at the rank of species and below, and the validity of
some nomenclatures in the tribe Triticeae other than genetic reasons, such as the invalid genus
name Dasypyrum (Coss. & Durieu) T. Durand, etc. have been discussed in another monograph
(Yen & Yang, 1999, 2004).
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木原均,Á.洛夫与小麦族(禾本科)的现代
遗传学属的概念
1颜 济* 1杨俊良 2颜 旸
1(四川农业大学小麦研究所 四川都江堰 611830)
2(Department of Biology and Microbiology, South Dakota State University, Brookings, SD 57006, USA)
摘要 分类学是认识生物体的一种工具,对生物体间系统关系的理解,种质资源利用的指南,也是一种交
流用的普通语言。因此,分类处理需要反映这些关系的近期认识。在自然界,生物体只有两个绝对的单位：
个体与种。一个种是一群个体被不可缺少的生殖关系相互联系成为的一个绝对单位。生殖隔离是种与
种间的基本界限,同时也是生物演化过程中形成独立基因库(gene pools)的惟一因素。既然在种以上的分
类群没有绝对界线,在种以上的任一分类处理都不可能避免人为性。虽然如此,仍然必须作出某些分类适
应它们的描述、利用与(或)研究。这篇文章对小麦族分类群间生物系统关系的划分是基于遗传学的研究。
我们分类处理的原则是：(1)反映这些种系统演化现今的理解;(2)便于种质资源的利用;(3)避免与传统处
理有不必要的剧烈改变。
关键词 分类学; 属; 分类原则; 生物系统学; 染色体组