Abroma
genus of plants
Abroma is a genus of flowering plants in the family Malvaceae. It includes a single species, Abroma augustum, sometimes written Abroma augusta, and commonly known as devil's cotton. It is a shrub or tree native to tropical Asia, ranging from the Himalayas and southern China through Indochina and Malesia to New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.
Abroma augustum has dark red flowers with a characteristic and unusual appearance. The leaves and stems are covered with soft bristly hairs that are very irritating to the touch. The bark yields a jute-like fiber. It is used as a traditional medicinal plant.
Taxonomy
The species was first described as Theobroma augustum (or Theobroma augusta) by Carl Linnaeus in 1768.
The genus was described by Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin in 1776 with a single species Abroma fastuosum, which was illustrated and described. However, because Jacquin was renaming Theobroma augusta L., according to the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants, he was required to use the name Abroma augustum, and A. fastuosum is an illegitimate name.
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This entry incorporates text from “Abroma” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.