Leaf cuticle micromorphology of Fagus L. (Fagaceae) species

Abstract

a b s t r a c tCuticle micromorphology of all eight species of Fagus and an outgroup were examined in the present study. The genus Trigonobalanus was selected as the outgroup. Thirteen characteristics of the inner surface and five of the outer surface of the cuticle were described. Some characteristics, such as the subsidiary cell shape, size of stomata, arrangement of subsidiary cell, shape of anticlinal and periclinal cell walls, texture of periclinal cell wall, development epicuticular wax, and presence of papillae, were considered important for infrageneric classification. The topology was obtained from the analysis using two major lineages: (1) Fagus engleriana þ Fagus japonica þ Fagus longipetiolata and (2) Fagus sylvatica þ Fagus crenata þ Fagus lucida þ Fagus hayatae þ Fagus grandifolia. The first clade supported a bootstrap value of 98% and the second clade a bootstrap value of 97%. Based on the cuticle morphology, our results support the previous study, by revealing F. engleriana, F. japonica, and F. longipetiolata with long peduncles in one group and the remaining extant species of short-to medium-length peduncles in another group. In addition, molecular phylogenetic study of Fagus based on ribosomal DNA ITS and chloroplast DNA sequences data supports this assemblage. This study shows that cuticle micromorphological characteristics provide useful and important information for analyzing the evolutionary aspects of Fagus.

Quantifying particulate matter reduction and their deposition on the leaves of green infrastructure

“…Fagus sylvatica is identified as one of common hedge plant in northwestern Europe with a high level of ecosystem service delivery, including high PM and gaseous pollutant capture (Blanusa et al, 2019 and references therein). This native European species has broadly elliptical leaves with deciduous foliage; it has weakly developed a smooth layer of wax on the leaf surface (Cho et al, 2014;Tomaszewski and Zieli, 2014). In addition, it has shown high air pollution tolerance and low generation of ground-level O 3 (Blanusa et al, 2019 and references therein).…”

The water absorbability of beech (Fagus sylvatica l.) and fir (Abies alba mill.) organic matter in the forest floor

“…The size and density of stomata depend on many factors, such as genetic conditions, age of needles/leaves and trees, and insolation (Franich et al 1977, Hejnowicz 2002. Hypostomatic beech leaves have elliptical stomata (Cho et al 2014), and their average size is 23.5 μm (Denk 2003). According to Sweeney (2014), the width of stomata depends on the tree species; in Pinus sylvestris, Picea abies and Abies alba it is: 24.6, 33.1 and 25.9 μm, respectively.…”