Irregular cytokinesis during microsporogenesis of psychotria myriantha Mull. Arg.

The Rubiaceae family is composed of approximately 550 genera and 9000 species. In spite of its great number of species and importance, few cytological studies on the genus Psychotria are extant, whereas cytogenetic analyses deal with the number of chromosomes of a few species. This study describes for the first time the meiotic process during the microsporogenesis of P. myriantha. Analysis showed some irregularities during microsporogenesis and the most frequent is related to the cytokinesis process. Results show that 91.75% of microspores and 94.44% of pollen grains had normal behavior during the microsporogenesis process.