''Acanthocalycium'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

cactus A cactus (, or less commonly, cactus) is a member of the plant family Cactaceae, a family comprising about 127 genera with some 1750 known species of the order Caryophyllales. The word ''cactus'' derives, through Latin, from the Ancient Greek ...

consisting of several species from

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

. The taxon name comes from

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

''akantha'' (meaning ''prickly'') and ''kalyx'' (meaning ''buds''), which refers to the spines on the

floral tube In angiosperms, a hypanthium or floral cup is a structure where basal portions of the Sepal, calyx, the petal, corolla, and the stamens form a cup-shaped tube. It is sometimes called a floral tube, a term that is also used for corolla tube and cal ...

s. These plants are

globose A sphere () is a geometrical object that is a three-dimensional analogue to a two-dimensional circle. A sphere is the set of points that are all at the same distance from a given point in three-dimensional space.. That given point is the ce ...

to elongate, with numerous ribs on the spiny stems.

Flower A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants (plants of the division Angiospermae). The biological function of a flower is to facilitate reproduction, usually by providing a mechani ...

s range from white to pink to red and open during the day.

Taxonomy

''Spinicalycium'' Fric (nom. inval.) has been brought into

synonymy A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

with this genus. Besides, the genus ''Acanthocalycium'' has been periodically included in the genus ''

Echinopsis ''Echinopsis'' is a large genus of cacti native Native may refer to: People * Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** ...

''.

Species

References

* Edward F. Anderson, ''The Cactus Family'' (Timber Press, 2001), pp. 105–106 * Willy Cullmann, Erich Götz & Gerhard Gröner, ''The Encyclopedia of Cacti'' (Alphabooks, 1086). pp. 124–125 Gymnocalycium (acanthocalycium) violaceum

Gymnocalycium (acanthocalycium) violaceum

{{Taxonbar, from=Q133858 Cacti of South America Endemic flora of Argentina Cactoideae genera