''Tuberaria lignosa'' is a species of perennial rock-rose native to the western

Mediterranean region In biogeography, the Mediterranean Basin (; also known as the Mediterranean Region or sometimes Mediterranea) is the region of lands around the Mediterranean Sea that have mostly a Mediterranean climate, with mild to cool, rainy winters and wa ...

Description

''Tuberaria lignosa'' is a

perennial A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also wide ...

herb, often woody towards the base. It reaches a height of and branches freely. Its leaves are simple, long and wide. The

inflorescence An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed o ...

is lax, with each flower in diameter.

Distribution and ecology

''Tuberaria lignosa'' is found around the western

Mediterranean Basin In biogeography, the Mediterranean Basin (; also known as the Mediterranean Region or sometimes Mediterranea) is the region of lands around the Mediterranean Sea that have mostly a Mediterranean climate, with mild to cool, rainy winters and w ...

, in parts of Italy, France, mainland Spain, Portugal, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria and the Canary Islands.

Taxonomy

The species was first described by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

in his 1753 work ', as "''Cistus tuberaria''". It was later transferred to the genus ''

Helianthemum ''Helianthemum'' , known as rock rose, sunrose, rushrose, or frostweed,' ...

'', and when

Michel Félix Dunal Michel Félix Dunal (24 October 1789 in Montpellier – 29 July 1856 in Montpellier) was a French botanist. He was a professor of botany in Montpellier, France. He held the chair of natural history at the University of Montpellier from 1816 unt ...

erected ''Helianthemum'' sect. ''Tuberaria'' in 1824, he designated "''Helianthemum tuberaria''" as its

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

. In 1827, Robert Sweet published a description of "''Helianthemum lignosum''", but this name was invalid as a

junior synonym The Botanical and Zoological Codes of nomenclature treat the concept of synonymy differently. * In botanical nomenclature, a synonym is a scientific name that applies to a taxon that (now) goes by a different scientific name. For example, Linna ...

of ''H. tuberaria''. In 1836,

Édouard Spach Édouard Spach (23 November 1801 – 18 May 1879) was a French botanist. The son of a merchant in Strasbourg, in 1824 he went to Paris, where he studied botany with René Desfontaines (1750–1831) and Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu (1748–1836). ...

raised this subgenus to the rank of genus as ''

Tuberaria ''Tuberaria'' is a genus of about 12 species of annual or perennial plants in the rockrose family Cistaceae, native to western and southern Europe. They occur on dry, stony sites, often close to the sea. The leaves are in a rosette at the base ...

''; because the ''

International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants The ''International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants'' (ICN) is the set of rules and recommendations dealing with the formal botanical names that are given to plants, fungi and a few other groups of organisms, all those "trad ...

'' forbids

tautonym A tautonym is a scientific name of a species in which both parts of the name have the same spelling, such as ''Rattus rattus''. The first part of the name is the name of the genus and the second part is referred to as the ''specific epithet'' in ...

s (such as "''Tuberaria tuberaria''"), the next oldest available name has to be used. In 1922,

Gonçalo Sampaio Gonçalo António da Silva Ferreira Sampaio (29 March 1865 in São Gens de Calvos – 28 July 1937 in Porto) was a Portuguese botanist. He studied mathematics at the University of Coimbra and chemistry, mineralogy and botany at the Polytechni ...

introduced the combination ''Tuberaria lignosa'', which is the name generally used today. Some botanists consider the species part of the genus '' Xolantha'', in which case it is known as ''Xolantha tuberaria''.

Medical research

The plant has been researched for medical purposes in cancer treatment. An aqueous extract of Tuberaria lignosa inhibited cell growth, altered the cell cycle profile, and induced

apoptosis Apoptosis (from grc, ἀπόπτωσις, apóptōsis, 'falling off') is a form of programmed cell death that occurs in multicellular organisms. Biochemical events lead to characteristic cell changes (morphology) and death. These changes incl ...

of NCI-H460 Tumor Cell

References

External links

Dunal's publication of ''Helianthemum'' sect. ''Tuberaria''
in de Candolle's ''Prodromus'' {{Taxonbar, from=Q6153634 Cistaceae Flora of Southwestern Europe Flora of Italy Flora of Sicily Flora of North Africa Flora of the Canary Islands Plants described in 1753 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus