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Concept
Phaseolus
Summary
Phaseolus (bean, wild bean) is a genus of herbaceous to woody annual and perennial vines in the family Fabaceae containing about 70 plant species, all native to the Americas, primarily Mesoamerica.
It is one of the most economically important legume genera. Five of the species have been domesticated since pre-Columbian times for their beans: P. acutifolius (tepary bean), P. coccineus (runner bean), P. dumosus (year bean), P. lunatus (lima bean), and P. vulgaris (common bean). Most prominent among these is the common bean, P. vulgaris, which today is cultivated worldwide in tropical, semitropical, and temperate climates.
Phaseolus species are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species, including common swift, garden dart, ghost moth Hypercompe albicornis, H. icasia and the nutmeg.
The generic name Phaseolus was introduced by Linnaeus in 1753, from the Latin phaseolus, a diminutive of phasēlus, in turn borrowed from Greek φάσηλος 'cowpea', of unknown origin. The Latin word phaseolus is often incorrectly glossed as 'kidney bean', a New World crop.
Previous classifications placed a number of other well-known legume species in this genus, but they were subsequently reassigned to the genus Vigna, sometimes necessitating a change of species name. For example, older literature refers to the mung bean as Phaseolus aureus, whereas more modern sources classify it as Vigna radiata. Similarly, the snail bean Vigna caracalla was discovered in 1753 and in 1970 moved from Phaseolus to Vigna. The modern understanding of Phaseolus indicates a genus endemic only to the New World.
Species have been organized into eight groups based on phylogenetic clades:
Filiformis group
Phaseolus angustissimus A.
Official source
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Related concepts (13)
Legume
A legume (ˈlɛɡjuːm,_ləˈɡjuːm) is a plant in the family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seed of such a plant. When used as a dry grain, the seed is also called a pulse. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consumption, for livestock forage and silage, and as soil-enhancing green manure. Well-known legumes include beans, soybeans, chickpeas, peanuts, lentils, lupins, grass peas, mesquite, carob, tamarind, alfalfa, and clover.
Phaseolus vulgaris
Phaseolus vulgaris, the common bean, is a herbaceous annual plant grown worldwide for its edible dry seeds or green, unripe pods. Its leaf is also occasionally used as a vegetable and the straw as fodder. Its botanical classification, along with other Phaseolus species, is as a member of the legume family Fabaceae. Like most members of this family, common beans acquire the nitrogen they require through an association with rhizobia, which are nitrogen-fixing bacteria. The common bean has a long history of cultivation.
Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica is a historical region and cultural area that begins in the southern part of North America and extends to most of Central America, thus comprising the lands of central Mexico, Belize, and Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua, and northern Costa Rica. In the pre-Columbian era, many societies flourished in Mesoamerica for more than 3,000 years before the Spanish colonization of the Americas begun at Hispaniola island in 1493.