THE DATABASE ON INTRASPECIFIC TAXONOMY OF CONIFEROUS PLANTS OF
Knyazeva S.G., Milyutin
L.I., Muratova E.N., Larionova
A.Ya., Oreshkova N.V.
V.N. Sukachev
Institute of Forest SB RAS,
In laboratory of Forest Genetics and
Plant Breeding of V. N. Sukachev Institute of Forest of
the SB of the RAS, the database "Biodiversity of the conifers of
The base consists of two large
blocks: the first one is the block of the information about species, and the
second one is the block on intraspecific taxonomy of species.
Except the dendrological description and the area characteristic,
the first block includes data on synonymies of species, the characteristic of karyotype (a general description, all determined numbers of
chromosomes, the bibliography) and genetic polymorphism of species (a general
characteristic and the bibliography), and also the information on geographical
cultures and plantations of species. This block gives the first preliminary
representations about a degree of a level of scrutiny of species and its
polymorphism, both at a level of morphology and anatomy, and at a level of karyology and genetics.
The main block of base is one of intraspecific taxonomy and the biodiversity. In it, all
data are broken into two sections which are structured according to different
schemes. The first one is the section intraspecific taxa and polymorphism of species. The information about the
name, the author of taxon description, morphological
description, the areal, and the bibliography of the
works, concerning each taxon is given for each of taxon.
The second section can be named
section of primary data or characteristics of variability of species
populations. The information of this section can be broken into three parts.
The first part includes sets of primary material collection (the name of set,
coordinates, climatic description, etc.). The second part contains the description
of the investigated features (the schemes and units of measurement, and also
methods used). All features are broken into groups: morphological (quantitative
and qualitative), anatomic, karyological,
biochemical, genetic for simplification of information search. The third part
contains statistic indices for exact features in definite collection sets - the
values of an arithmetic mean and other statistics.
We undertake attempt to unify and to
visualize scales, for the decision of terminological problems in the
description of intraspecific divisions and gradation
of features. For this purpose the samples of the cone scales, the cones, the needles,
and the seeds are scanned, processed (with use of one-dimensional and
multivariate statistics) and brought in the databank. It will allow distinguishing
separate intraspecific divisions, to give them the
name, to describe all known synonymies and to create schemes, scales and
formulas for their definition.
The general fullness of a database at
present comprises 13 species and more than 400 intraspecific
taxa, 150 populations from different collection sets
and about 500 references.
Thus, the
database will allow an evaluation of examination degree for each species and
give a possibility to make an estimation of Siberian conifer biodiversity. It
will promote, on the one hand, to preservation and reproduction of the most
valuable forms of coniferous plants and, by that, the preservation of genetic
resources of species, and on the other hand, will promote the development and
improvement of intraspecific taxonomy of species. It
is a necessary condition for successful research in plant biodiversity.