Flora of North America species comparison

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Arabidopsis

mouse-ear cress, rock-cress, thale cress
Habit Annuals, biennials, or perennials; (stoloniferous or with woody caudex); not scapose; glabrous or pubescent, trichomes simple, mixed with stalked, 1–3-forked ones.
Stems

erect, ascending, or decumbent, unbranched or branched distally, (usually glabrous distally).
Leaves

basal and cauline;

petiolate, sessile, or subsessile;

basal rosulate, petiolate, blade margins entire, toothed, or pinnately lobed;

cauline blade margins usually entire or dentate, rarely lyrate.
Racemes

(few- to several-flowered), not elongated in fruit.
Flowers

sepals erect or ascending, usually oblong (or ovate), (lateral pair sometimes saccate or subsaccate basally);

petals white, lavender, or purplish [pink, purple], obovate, spatulate, or oblanceolate, claw differentiated from blade or not, (apex obtuse or emarginate);

stamens slightly tetradynamous;

filaments not dilated basally;

anthers oblong or ovate, (apex obtuse);

nectar glands confluent, subtending bases of stamens.
Fruiting pedicels

ascending, divaricate, or slightly reflexed, slender.
Fruits

siliques, dehiscent, shortly stipitate or subsessile, linear, smooth or somewhat torulose, terete or latiseptate;

valves (papery), each not veined or midvein prominent or obscure, glabrous;

replum rounded;

septum complete;

ovules 15–80 per ovary; (style obsolete or distinct, to 1 mm);

stigma capitate.
Seeds

usually uniseriate, plump or flattened, not winged or margined, oblong, ovoid, or ellipsoid;

seed coat (minutely reticulate), mucilaginous or not when wetted;

cotyledons usually accumbent, rarely incumbent.
x

= 5, 8.

Arabidopsis
Distribution
from USDA
North America; Europe; n Asia; e Asia
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Species 10 (4 in the flora).

The limits of Arabidopsis have been the subject of long controversy, and more than 50 species were placed in the genus (I. A. Al-Shehbaz et al. 1999). The delimitation of the genus was based primarily on the presence of branched trichomes, linear fruits, and accumbent or incumbent cotyledons. That combination of characteristics evolved independently multiple times in Brassicaceae. Extensive molecular data and critical evaluation of morphology have shown that Arabidopsis is polyphyletic (S. L. O’Kane and Al-Shehbaz 2003). Nine of the ten species in the genus are native to Europe; only A. arenicola is endemic to North America.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Key
1. Annuals; petals 2-3.5(-4) mm; fruits 0.5-0.8 mm wide; seeds 0.3-0.5 mm.
A. thaliana
1. Biennials or perennials; petals 4-10 mm; fruits 0.8-2.5 mm wide; seeds 0.8-1.4 mm
→ 2
2. Fruits terete or slightly flattened, (0.8-)1-2(-2.8) cm × 1.5-2.2(-2.5) mm; cotyledons incumbent.
A. arenicola
2. Fruits flattened, (1.5-)2-4(-4.5) cm × 0.8-1.8(-2) mm; cotyledons accumbent
→ 3
3. Basal leaf blade margins pinnatisect or pinnatipartite; petals with 2 lateral teeth on claws.
A. arenosa
3. Basal leaf blade margins entire, dentate, lyrate, or lyrate-pinnatifid; petals without teeth on claws.
A. lyrata
Source FNA vol. 7, p. 447. Author: Ihsan A. Al-Shehbaz.
Parent taxa Brassicaceae > tribe Camelineae
Subordinate taxa
A. arenicola, A. arenosa, A. lyrata, A. thaliana
Name authority (de Candolle) Heynhold: in F. Holl and G. Heynhold, Fl. Sachsen 1: 538. (1842)
Web links 
Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



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