SEM studies on seed surface of wild and cultivated species of Vigna Savi

Abstract

Scanning electron microphotographs of seed surface patterns of three wild and five cultivated species ofVigna are provided and described. The seed surface patterns are species-specific and showed no interpopulation variation. To promote the use of technical terms in SEM studies of seed surface and to serve as a ready reference a table explaining the 13 terms adopted by us is given. The importance of study of seed surface especially in taxonomy is discussed.