Image: Wikimedia Commons (See link for license)
Legume family🌿
Fabaceae
マメ科
A massive family with approximately 20,000 known species. Includes important food crops such as soybeans, common beans, and peas. The most notable feature is nitrogen fixation through symbiosis with rhizobia, enabling growth in poor soils. Identified by papilionaceous flowers and legume pods.
Key Characteristics
- ●Papilionaceous flowers common (standard, wing, and keel petals)
- ●Fruit is a legume (pod)
- ●Root nodules harbor symbiotic rhizobia for nitrogen fixation
- ●Leaves mostly compound
Morphological Traits
A family may include species with different trait values — multiple values indicate the range within the family.
Leaf arrangement
Alternate / Opposite / Whorled
Leaf type
Compound / Simple
Venation
Palmate / Parallel / Pinnate
Leaf margin
Entire
Growth form
Herb / Shrub / Tree / Vine
Evergreen/Deciduous
Deciduous / Evergreen
Compound type
Bipinnate / Palmate / Pinnate / Ternate
Leaf dissection
Dissected / Undivided
Stipules
Absent / Present
Aromatic
Aromatic / None
Flower symmetry
Actinomorphic / Zygomorphic
Petal count
3 petals / 5 petals / 6 petals / Many
Petal fusion
Free / Fused
Ovary position
Superior
Stamen count
3-4 / 5
Plant sex
Hermaphrodite / Monoecious
Phylogenetic Position
Angiosperms > Eudicots > Core eudicots > Fabales > Fabaceae
Divergence Era
Late Cretaceous to Paleogene (approx. 70–60 million years ago)
Representative Genera
Related Evolution Events
- ・Evolution of symbiosis with rhizobia
- ・Rapid diversification from the late Cretaceous to Paleogene