Euphorbiaceae
English: Spurge family.
Dutch: Wolfsmelkachtigen.
Botany: 300 genera, 5000 species; herbs, shrubs and trees; unisexual; small, highly reduced flowers, accentuated by pseudanthal states; some are like cacti with thorns; leaves alternate; latex.
Content: milky latex, with caoutchouc, rubber; diterpenes; triterpenes, triterpen esters, lanosterol, cycloartenol, 24-methylene-cycloartenol, decan acid, dodecan acid, DOPA; polyhydroxy-diterpenes, which are cancer promotors; forbol, ingenol; phenolic acids; lectins.
Taxonomy
Euphorbiaceae and Peraceae form a monophyletic group in the Apg3 classification. Picrodendraceea and Phyllantaceae were a part of Euphorbiaceae in the past. They are treated here as one group. Rafflesiaceae, a parasitic plant family, is member of the Euphorbiaceae group in the Apg3 classification.
In the Plant theory Rafflesiaceae is treated as separate and placed in Subphase 7, being parasitic. Euphorbiaceae is treated as one family with Peraceae, Phyllanthaceae and Picrodendraceae. Euphorbiaceae is placed in Subphase 4.
Euphorbiales
Euphorbiaceae
Euphorbioideae
Crotonoideae
Acalyphoideae
Rafflesiaceae
Peraceae