Ivanov, O.V., A.M. Pyatnitskiy, M.S. Ignatov & E.V. Maslova. AREOANA analysis of moss leaf cell structure of two Cyrtomnium species (Mniaceae, Bryophyta)

Arctoa (2013) 22: 51-60

 

Two species of the moss genus Cyrtomnium were studied for the parameters of their leaf cells. The computer program AREOANA, specially designed for this kind of studies, allows involving large datasets in the analysis. In this study, it processed 81 leaves with altogether 140 000 cells. Quite a bit different in their basic characteristics (area, length, width, length to width ratio, angle between the cell length and costa, number of cell corners), both species leaves showed considerable and stable differences in area distributions of cells taken separately with 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 corneres, which allows discri­mination by statistical methods with 6% accuracy. A possible relation of useful quantitative para­meters with leaf morphogenesis is discussed.