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Genus Abelmoschus Medik (family - Malvaceae Juss.) comprising about 11 species in India. Among which some are cultivated on an economic scale as important vegetables and the rest are wild. Apart from cultivated species, wild species of Abelmoschus also showed a wide range of phytochemicals and nutritional components. Abelmoschus esculentus (L.) Moench an economically important vegetable crop popularly known as okra which cultivated throughout the world. Nutritionally, okra plays an important role in the human diet because it has enormous value of nutritional factors like carbohydrates, protein, fibers, minerals and vitamins, including vitamin C. Mucilage obtained from Abelmoschus is natural and digestive in nature and used as a tablet binder. The plant shows various pharmacological activities like, antioxidants, antidiabetic, antiulcer and antimicrobial. Apart from cultivated species, the studies on wild species were carried out and concluded some important findings viz. Abelmoschus manihot (L.) Medik. is rich source of various secondary metabolites like; hyperin, isoquercetin, myricetin, hibifolin, adenosine and stigmasterol. Abelmoschus ficulneus (L.) Wight & Arn. and A. manihot are consumed by the local people worldwide. The present chapter is focused on the previous work done in genus Abelmoschus in the area of nutrition, phytochemical, genetic diversity and breeding.

In this study, karyotypes of three taxa in the genus Argyreia Lour. were examined. The chromosome counts for A. osyrensis and A. setosa were reported for the first time while somatic chromosome count of A. cuneata was confirmed. The three taxa studied were diploid with 2n = 2x = 30. Highest total chromosome length in Argyreia osyrensis was 54.25 μm with mean chromosome length (MCL) of 3.62 μm. The lowest in Argyreia setosa as 46.04 μm with the mean chromosome length of 3.07 μm. The karyotypes of the species were examined on the grounds of various karyotype asymmetry indices. Two of them, A. cuneata and A. osyrensis fell in the 3A while A. setosa belonged to the 4A category of Stebbins’ classification.

The present article describes and illustrates a new species of Commelina from dryland hillocks of Karnataka, India. The new species Commelina rupestris shares morphological similarities with C. badamica, C. hirsuta and C. attenuata, but differs in its perennial habit, knotted rhizomatous, definite base, broadly elongate, thickened tuberous roots, characteristically ligulate, linear to lanceolate leaves, minutely fused spathes, one- to two-seeded bilocular capsules, and stramineous to light brown, rostrate seeds.