Systematic Studies On Sasinae

Sasinae is one of comparative small shrub-like monopodial bamboos and mainly distributs in southern provinces of China. Metasasa and Ferrocalamus once attributed to Sasinae have been controversial. Whether some species of Sasa and Indocalamus can be combined and belonged to other genus or not still has many problems. The native systematic history and present status of Sasinae were reviewed based on classical taxonomy, comparative anatomy of the rhizomes, numerical taxonomy, as well as three kinds of molecular markers.Interspecies genetic distance of 32 species in Sasinae were analyzed using RAPD, ISSR and SSR, The results showed:(1)The phenograms were constructed by three types of molecular markers to cluster 32 species researched based on the availability of auricles.(2)The dendogram by molecular markers confirmed that Metasasa not belong to Sasinae.(3)The analysis of RAPD and ISSR does not support I. lacunosus as a synonym of I. latifolius, Ferrrocalamus was attributed to a separate genera.(4)The results of RAPD were in consistance with that of the analysis of morphology.The results of the numerical taxonomy showed: (1)As a typical characteristic, the auricle separates 32 species into two groups.(2)Sasamorpha was not supported to belong to Sasa, and was closely related to Indocalamus.The anatomic studies on 17 rhizome samples reveals that air canal was not discoveried and the distribution of fiber srrand can be used as the basis for defining infra-species taxon.In the basis of checking type specimen, original description, and field observation, Four species and a variety such as S. fortunei were excluded from Sasinae. I. pseudosinicus var. densinervillus and I. guangdongensis var. mollis were attributed respectively to their original variant. In this paper, 32 species and 4 varieties of native Sasinae were recorded and described briefly, 4 new combinations including 2 species and 2 varieties were given.