The Compositae in the Flora of North America North of Mexico (CFNA)

北美植物区系墨西哥北部菊科(CFNA)是一个项目，旨在说明发生在墨西哥北部北美种植以外的菊科(也称为菊科)植物科的所有成员。在墨西哥北部的北美，分布着约2600种植物，隶属于425个属，使其成为该地区迄今为止最大的植物科。CFNA包含了大约70名贡献作者的工作，他们在他们的小组中被公认为专家。他们的贡献是基于他们自己的田野调查，加上标本馆、实验室和图书馆的工作。CFNA与北美植物群(FNA)计划有关，该计划的目标是解释墨西哥北部大陆上出现的所有维管束植物和苔藓植物。奇怪的是，从来没有人在整个大陆范围内考虑过整个植物区系。CFNA的产品以与FNA兼容的风格和格式分三卷介绍。这项工作由牛津大学出版社以硬拷贝形式出版，但随着章节的完成，它们将发布在FNA的网站(www.fna.org)上。未来的目标是以电子格式提供所有材料，以便根据需要方便地管理和修订这些信息。CFNA由位于沃斯堡的德克萨斯植物研究所(BRIT)管理，工作由菊科编辑委员会(COMPED)协调，该委员会由BRIT的T.Barkley、蒙特利尔大学的L.Brouillet和加州大学伯克利分校的J.Strother组成。此外，还有一名技术编辑和助理，以及植物艺术家的服务。菊科植物在北美数量丰富且引人注目，其中包括鼠尾草、鼠尾草、黄花，当然还有向日葵。这个家庭的许多成员都是严重的杂草，有些是有毒的，有些是有积极经济意义的。这个家庭是环保主义者、生态学家、农学家、园艺学家、杂草科学家和其他人非常关注的问题，最终也是普通公众的关注。科的传统概念，即标准的美国和加拿大地区性花卉作品(例如，加州高等植物杰普森手册)中使用的概念源于19世纪中叶。过去四分之一个世纪的研究表明，这些概念需要广泛修改，以描绘自然的亲缘关系和血统。这不仅仅是象牙塔理论，因为已经非常清楚地表明，对生物之间相互关系的准确了解对于理解如何管理我们的环境以及未来可能发生的事情都是必不可少的。这些复杂研究的成果通常只在其他植物学家之间传播，但像CFNA这样的植物学研究的目标是将这些发现转化为对植物学信息消费者有用的作品。投稿的作者有义务让他们的治疗反映出目前的理解。人们尊重19世纪的植物学家，他们创造了对家庭的有用理解，并希望纳入CFNA的计划在未来几年将同样有用。这些处理包括检索表、植物学描述和所有实体的命名考虑，加上范围和生境声明、小分布图以及法律地位、毒性、有用性、杂草等信息。约四分之一的物种由为CFNA准备的线条图说明。其目标是在2004年底在墨西哥北部的北美出版三卷治疗菊科植物的书籍。

The Compositae in the Flora of North America north of Mexico (CFNA) is a project to account for all members of the plant family Compositae (also called the Asteraceae) that occur outside of cultivation in North America north of Mexico. There are some 2,600 species distributed among 425 genera in North America north of Mexico, making it by far the largest family of plants in the region. The CFNA incorporates the work of some 70 contributing authors, who are recognized as experts in their groups. Their contributions are based on their own field studies, plus herbarium, laboratory, and library work. The CFNA is associated with the Flora of North America (FNA) program, whose goal is to account for all of the vascular plants and the bryophytes that occur in the continent north of Mexico. Curiously, no continent-wide consideration of the whole flora has ever been done. The products of the CFNA are being presented in three volumes in a style and format compatible with the FNA. The work is being published in hard copy by the Oxford University Press, but as sections are completed they are posted on the FNA website (www.fna.org). A future goal is to make all materials available in electronic format, so that the information can be both easily managed and revised, as needed. The CFNA is managed at the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT) in Fort Worth, and the work is coordinated by the Compositae Editorial Committee (CompEd) consisting of T. Barkley at BRIT, L. Brouillet at the University of Montreal, and J. Strother at the Univeristy of California - Berkeley. In addition, there is a technical editor and assistants, plus the services of botanical artists. Members of the family Compositae are both abundant and conspicuous in North America, and among them are the sagebrushes, ragweeds, goldenrods, and of course, sunflowers. Many members of the family are serious weeds, some are toxic, and some are of positive economic significance. The family is of great concern to environmentalists, ecologists, agronomists, horticulturalists, weed scientists, and others, and ultimately to the general public. The traditional concepts of the family, i.e., the concepts employed in standard American and Canadian regional floristic works (e.g., The Jepson Manual of the Higher Plants of California) stem from the middle of the 19th century. Research of the past quarter century has shown that these concepts require extensive revision so as to depict natural affinities and lineages. This is not mere ivory-towerism, for it has been made abundantly clear that an accurate knowledge of interrelationships among organisms is essential to understanding both how to manage our environment and what kinds of things may happen in the future. The products of these sophisticated studies usually circulate only among other botanists, but it is the goal of floristic studies such as the CFNA to translate these findings into works that are useful to the consumers of botanical information. The contributing authors are obliged to make their treatments reflect current understanding. Respect is given to the 19th century botanists who created a useful understanding of the family, and it is hoped that the schemes being incorporated into the CFNA will be equally useful for years to come. The treatments include keys, botanical descriptions, and considerations of nomenclature for all entities, plus statements of range and habitat, small distribution maps, and information on legal status, toxicity, usefulness, weediness, etc. About a quarter of the species are illustrated by line drawings prepared for the CFNA. The goal is to present the three volumes treating the Compositae in North America north of Mexico at the end of 2004.