Pollen morphologyof the genus Silene Sileneae-Caryophyllaceae from Pakistan

Authors : Sumaira SAHREEN, Mir Ajab KHAN, Akbar Ali MEO, Asma JABEEN

Pages : 74-85

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Publication Date : 2008-05-01

Article Type : Research Paper

Abstract :Pollen morphological studies of 16 species of the genus Silene have been carried out from Pakistan. Pollen grains are polypantoporate or periporate at polar view. There is a great variation in pollen morphology in the species of Silene.In Silene conoidea 22 – 24 number of pores is a species specific character. Silene brahuica, S. conoidea, S. moorcroftiana, S. ovalifolia, S. villosa, and S. vulgaris have thin exine with 20 and more than 20 number of pori . In S. apetala, S. citrina, S. longisepala and S. kunawerensis exine thickness is 5-7.25µ m, then number will be 4-10. The palynological features of exine thickness, size of pollen and pori, distance between two pores and pori surface are found useful criteria for species delimitation while sculpturing at LM turned out to be a poor criterion. A dichotomous key is constructed for the species identification using the characters that has been studied
Keywords : Pollen, Silene, Caryophyllaceae, Pori, Exine