Juncaceae

Juncaceae

[‚jəŋ′kās·ē‚ē]

(botany)

A family of monocotyledonous plants in the order Juncales characterized by an inflorescence of diverse sorts, vascular bundles with abaxial phloem, and cells without silica bodies.

McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms, 6E, Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Juncaceae

 

(rush), a family of monocotyledonous plants including perennial and annual herbs and, less commonly, shrubs. The leaves have sheaths and linear or cylindrical blades; sometimes all the leaves are reduced to sheaths. The inconspicuous flowers are regular and usually bisexual; they are pollinated by the wind and gathered in capitate, fascicular, pa-nicled, or umbellate inflorescences. Rarely are the flowers solitary. The perianth is usually calycine and composed of six greenish or brownish segments. There are usually six stamens. The fruit is a capsule, surrounded by the perianth.

There are eight or nine genera, comprising approximately 400 species. The plants grow in temperate and cold regions and in high-mountain tropics, usually in moist and swampy places. The genera Juncus and Luzula are found in both hemispheres; both are represented in the USSR (about 100 species). The remaining genera are found only in the southern hemisphere.

REFERENCE

Takhtadzhian, A. L. Sistema i filogeniia tsvetkovykh rastenii. Moscow-Leningrad, 1966.

T. V. EGOROVA

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.