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Systematics And Evolution Of The Arundinoideae And Micrairoideae (Poaceae), Jordan Kinsley Teisher

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The grass family, Poaceae, is one of the most ecologically and economically important plant groups on Earth. However, the large size (over 11,000 species) and geographic range of the family makes complete resolution of the evolutionary relationships in Poaceae challenging, with some significant groups remaining neglected. Two such understudied clades, subfamilies Arundinoideae and Micrairoideae, possess an incredible amount of morphological and ecological diversity for their sizes, making them a potentially rewarding system in which to study evolution of a wide range of grass features. In this dissertation, I resolved many of the long-standing systematic issues in Arundinoideae and Micrairoideae and …