459 N Save Nature to Survive 6(3) : 459-462, 2011 www.thebioscan.in MORPHOMETRICS OF GENUS CASSIA L.FROM KOLHAPUR DISTRICT S. A. DESHMUKH Department of Botany, The New College, Kolhapur - 416 012, Maharashtra, INDIA E-mail: sageraea@gmail.com INTRODUCTION Cassia L. sensu lato. is one of the twenty five largest genera of dicotyledonous plants which occur naturally in the tropics around the world (Boonkerd et al., 2005). Kolhapur is the extreme Southern district of Maharashtra State, situated between 17 0 17’ to 15 0 43’ NL and 73 0 40’ and 74 0 42’ EL from where, 19 different Cassia L. species including one variety have been recorded (Yadav and Sardesai, 2002). The genus comprise trees , shrubs or herbs which are characterized by having abruptly pinnate leaves with various types of stipules, rachis furnished with glands either in between the leaflets or on the petiole, inflorescence axillary or terminal racemes or panicles, stamens unequal normally 10 all perfect, or 3-5 imperfect, ovary sessile or stalked, pod variable, terete or flat (Cooke, 1901). Cassia L. species are not easily differentiated from each other; their taxonomy and nomenclature are quite complex due to overlapping morphological characters and great range of similarities present in between them (Kumar et al., 2007).This usually leads to mis identification and mis interpretation of the components (Singh, 2001). Majority of the Cassia L. species have long history of economic importance, especially as medicinal plants (Burkill, 1935), so its proper taxonomy has great significance. Morphometrics permits numerical comparison between different forms and it has great significance in distinct grouping or separation of closely related species. MATERIALS AND METHODS Ten different Cassia L. species were collected from various regions of Kolhapur district during the years 2009 and 2010. Collected species were identified with the help of standard literature. Measurements of various quantitative characters (viz. leaf length, leaflet length, leaflet width, petiole length, pedicel length, petal length, petal width, fruit length, fruit width, seed length and seed width) were taken with the help of thread and line ruler. Mean values were obtained and processed for principal component analysis and cluster analysis by keeping data standardized at similarity matrix and tolerance of Eigen analysis set at 1E-010. The coefficient of difference (CD) was calculated for all the characters in between all the taxa according to Mayr (1969). RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Principal component analysis and cluster analysis are widely used in the field of numerical taxonomy (Soladoye et al., 2010). Present study deals with the ten different Cassia species widely distributed in Kolhapur district, these are Cassia abscus L., Cassia alata L., Cassia auriculata L., Cassia obtusifolia L., Cassia occidentalis L., Cassia simea Lamk., Cassia sophera L., Cassia surrattensis Burm.f. spp. glauca (Lam.) K.& S., Cassia tora L. and Cassia uniflora Mill. Various quantitative characters alongwith their mean are tabulated in Table 1. The results obtained from PCA shows that four characters which are related with the leaf i.e. leaf length, leaflet length, leaflet width and leaflet length/leaflet width are significant in delimitation of the Cassia L. species as their eigenvalue is greater than 1 represented in Table 2 and Fig. 1. PCA results (Table 4) also reveals the correlation between leaf length and seed length/ seed width, leaf length and leaflet length, leaf length and leaflet width, leaf length and petiole ABSTRACT Morphometric study of ten different species of Cassia L. from Kolhapur District was performed with respect to the fourteen different quantitative characters; which includes leaf length, leaflet length, leaflet width, leaflet length/ leaflet width, petiole length, pedicel length, petal length, petal width, fruit length, fruit width, fruit length/ fruit width, seed length, seed width and seed length/ seed width. The dimensions of quantitative characters were measured and subjected to the principal component analysis (PCA) and cluster analysis. PCA results reveals the correlation between all quantitative characters mentioning that four characters which are related with the leaf i.e. leaf length, leaflet length, leaflet width and leaflet length/leaflet width are significant in delimitation of the Cassia L. species. Cluster analysis and dendrogram on the basis of farthest neighbor, mean character difference and constrained clustering strategy shows that the dissimilarities in between Cassia abscus L. and Cassia alata L. is greater while that in between Cassia sophera L. and Cassia occidentalis L. is minimum. Coefficients of Difference values of all the species reveal that Cassia abscus L. and Cassia siamea Lamk. are distinctly separate from each other as they with more significant CD and Cassia occidentalis L. and Cassia sophera L. are closely related with each other, as well as quantitative characters like seed length/ seed width, fruit length/ fruit width, fruit width and petal width has vital contribution in differentiation of the taxa. KEY WORDS Morphometrics Cassia PCA Cluster analysis Received on : 13.04.2011 Accepted on : 19.07 2011