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Evolution and Systematics of Grasses The grass family is the fourth largest flowering plant family and is economically the most important, providing about 80% of global food and containing the top four crops that feed the world and more than 10 of the 30 most important crops. Our work on grasses (Poaceae) has moved from using morphological characters to molecular characters. At this point, we are combining information from prolamin (seed storage protein) proteins, prolamin genes, plastid matK gene and trnT-F non-coding region and, the ITS nuclear region. We have reconstructed with sequence data a phylogeny of the grass family, the subfamily Chloridoideae, and genera like Eleusine, Chloris and Oryza. We have generated the largest single-gene phylogeny for the grass family as a whole and also for the subfamily Chloridoideae. We have also used RFLP and RAPD in systematics at the genus and species levels. Articles on Evolution and Systematics of Grasses: Hilu, K. W. and K. Wright. 1982. Systematics of Poaceae: A Cluster Analysis Study. Taxon 31: 9?36. Soderstrom, T. R., K. W. Hilu, C. S. Campbell, and M. E. Barkworth (eds.). 1987. Grass Systematics and Evolution. Smithsonian Press, Washington, D.C. Hilu, K. W. 2000. Contributions of Prolamin Size Diversity and Structure to the Sytematics of the Poaceae. In Grass Systematics and Evolution. Vol. 2, Pp. 241-247. Proceedings of 2nd International Conference on the Comparative Biology of Monocotyledons, 1998, Sydney, Australia, eds. S. W. L. Jacobs and J. Everett. Melbourne: CSIRO Press. Werth, C. R., K. W. Hilu, and C. A. Langner. 1994. Isozymes of Eleusine (Gramineae) and the origin of finger millet. Amer. J. Bot., 81:1186?1197. Hilu, K. W. and J. L. Johnson. 1997. Systematics of Eleusine Gaertn. (Poaceae, Chloridoideae): Chloroplast DNA and total evidence. Annals Missouri Bot. Gard. 84: 841-847. Hilu, K. W. and L. A. Alice. 1999. Systematic and evolutionary implications of matk indels in Poaceae. Amer. J. Bot. 86: 1735-1741. Hilu, K. W., L. A. Alice and H. Liang. 1999. Phylogeny of Poaceae inferred from matK sequences. Annals of Missouri Bot. Gard. 86: 835-851. Mullins, I. M. and K. W. Hilu.2002.Sequence variation in the gene encoding the 10 kDa prolamin in Oryza(Poaceae): I. Phylogenetic Implications. Theoretical and Applied Genetics 105: 841-846. Hilu, K. W. 2003. The genus Eleusine. In. M. E. Barkworth and K. M. Capels (eds.). Manual of North American Grasses, vol. 25: 109-110. Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford, New York. Hilu, K. W. 2004. Phylogenetics and chromosomal evolution in the Poaceae (grasses). Australian Journal of Botany 52: 13-22.
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