Breynia is a genus in the flowering plant family Phyllanthaceae, first described in 1776. It is native to Southeast Asia, China, Réunion, the Indian Subcontinent, Papuasia and Australia.
The name Breynia is a conserved name, it is recognized despite the existence of an earlier use of the same name to refer to a different plant. Breynia L. 1753 is in the Capparaceae, but it is a rejected name. We here discuss Breynia J.R.Forst. & G.Forst. 1776.Govaerts, R., Frodin, D.G. & Radcliffe-Smith, A. (2000). World Checklist and Bibliography of Euphorbiaceae (and Pandaceae) 1-4: 1-1622. The Board of Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
In a 2006 revision of the Phyllanthaceae, it was recommended that Breynia be subsumed in Phyllanthus; however, new combinations in Phyllanthus for former Breynia species remain to be published.
Breynia are of special note in the fields of pollination biology and coevolution because they have a specialized mutualism with moths in the genus Epicephala (leafflower moths), in which the moths actively pollinate the flowers—thereby ensuring that the tree may produce viable seeds—but also lay eggs in the flowers' ovaries or in the space between the tepals and the carpel walls, from where their larvae consume a subset of the developing seeds as nourishment.Kawakita, A.; Kato, M. 2004. Obligate pollination mutualism in Breynia (Phyllanthaceae): further documentation of pollination mutualism involving Epicephala moths (Gracillariidae). American Journal of Botany. 91: 1319–1325.Zhang, J.; Wang, S.; Li, H.; Hu, B.; Yang, X.; Wang, Z. 2012. "Diffuse coevolution between two Epicephala species (Gracillariidae) and two Breynia species (Phyllanthaceae). PLOS ONE. 7: e41657. Other species of Epicephala are pollinators, and in some cases, non-pollinating seed predators, of certain species of plants in the genera PhyllanthusKawakita, A.; Kato, M. 2004. "Evolution of obligate pollination mutualism in New Caledonian Phyllanthus (Euphorbiaceae)." American Journal of Botany 91: 410–415.Kawakita, A.; Kato, M. 2009. "Repeated independent evolution of obligate pollination mutualism in the Phyllantheae-Epicephala association." Proceedings of the Royal Society B. 276: 417–426. and Glochidion,Kato, M.; Takimura, A.; Kawakita, A. (2003) "An obligate pollination mutualism and reciprocal diversification in the tree genus Glochidion (Euphorbiaceae)." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. 100 (9): 5264–5267Hembry, D. H.; Okamoto, T.; Gillespie, R. G. (2012) Repeated colonization of remote islands by specialized mutualists. Biology Letters. 8: 258–261.Luo, S.-X.; Yao, G.; Wang, Z.; Zhang, D.; Hembry, D. H. (2017) "A novel, enigmatic basal leafflower moth lineage pollinating a derived leafflower host illustrates the dynamics of host shifts, partner replacement, and apparent co-adaptation in intimate mutualisms." The American Naturalist. 189: 422–435. both closely related to Breynia.Kathriarachchi, H.; Samuel, R.; Hoffmann, P.; Mlinarec, J.; Wurdack, K. J.; Ralimanana, H.; Stuessy, T. F.; Chase, M. W. 2006. "Phylogenetics of tribe Phyllantheae (Phyllanthaceae: Euphorbiaceae sensu lato) based on nrITS and plastid matK DNA sequence data." American Journal of Botany. 93: 637–655. This relationship is similar to those between figs and fig wasps and yuccas and yucca moths.
Species 93 species are accepted. Breynia amabilis Breynia amoebiflora Breynia androgyna Breynia assimilis Breynia asteranthos Breynia asymmetrica Breynia baudouinii Beille – Vietnam Breynia beillei Breynia bicolor Breynia bishnupadae Breynia bonii Breynia brevipes Breynia calcarea (M.R.Hend.) Welzen & Pruesapan – W Malaysia Breynia carnosa Welzen & Pruesapan – Vietnam Breynia cernua (Poir.) Müll.Arg. – Northern Territory of Australia, New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Sulawesi, Philippines, Borneo, Java Breynia collaris Airy Shaw – Papua New Guinea Breynia coriacea Beille – Vietnam Breynia coronata Hook.f. – Thailand, W Malaysia, Borneo, Sumatra Breynia delavayi Breynia discigera Müll.Arg. – Thailand, W Malaysia, Sumatra Breynia discocalyx Breynia disticha J.R.Forst. & G.Forst. – Vanuatu, New Caledonia; naturalized in West Indies, Florida, Gambia, and scattered oceanic islands Breynia diversifolia Beille – Vietnam Breynia fleuryi Beille – Vietnam Breynia fruticosa (L.) Müll.Arg. – Vietnam, Thailand, S China Breynia garrettii Breynia glauca Craib – Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Borneo Breynia gour-maitii Breynia grandiflora Beille – Vietnam Breynia granulosa Breynia gynophora Breynia harmandii Breynia heteroblasta Breynia heyneana J.J.Sm. – Lesser Sunda Islands in Indonesia Breynia hiemalis Breynia hirsuta Breynia indosinensis Beille – Vietnam, Laos Breynia kerrii Breynia kitanovii Breynia lanceolata Breynia lithophila Welzen & Pruesapan – Thailand Breynia macrantha Breynia maichauensis Breynia massiei Beille – Laos Breynia micrasterias Breynia microphylla (Kurz ex Teijsm. & Binn.) Müll.Arg. – Sumatera, Java, Sulawesi Breynia mollis J.J.Sm. – New Guinea Breynia oblongifolia (Müll.Arg.) Müll.Arg. – Papua New Guinea, Queensland, New South Wales, Northern Territory Breynia obscura Welzen & Pruesapan – W Malaysia Breynia officinalis Breynia orbicularis Breynia pierrei Breynia platycalyx Airy Shaw – W New Guinea Breynia po-khantii Breynia podocarpa Airy Shaw – Papua New Guinea, Northern Territory Breynia poilanei Breynia poomae Breynia pseudorostrata Breynia pubescens Merr. – Maluku Breynia pulchella Breynia quadrangularis Breynia racemosa (Blume) Müll.Arg. – Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Thailand, Myanmar, W Malaysia, Sumatra, Java, Lesser Sunda Islands, Philippines, New Guinea, Bismarck Archipelago Breynia repanda Breynia repens Welzen & Pruesapan – Thailand Breynia reticulata Breynia retroversa Breynia retusa (Dennst.) Alston – Réunion, India, Tibet, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, E Himalayas, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, W Malaysia Breynia rhynchocarpa Benth. – Northern Territory of Australia Breynia rigida Breynia rostrata Merr. – Vietnam, S China Breynia saksenana Breynia septata Beille – Vietnam Breynia shawii Breynia similis Breynia spatulifolia Breynia stipitata Müll.Arg. – Northern Territory, Queensland Breynia subangustifolia Thin – Vietnam Breynia suberosa Breynia subindochinensis Thin – Vietnam Breynia subterblanca Breynia temii Breynia thoii Breynia thorelii Breynia thyrsiflora Breynia tiepii Breynia tonkinensis Beille – Vietnam Breynia trinervia Breynia tsiangii Breynia vestita Warb. – New Guinea, Kai Island in Maluku Province of Indonesia Breynia villosa Breynia virgata (Blume) Müll.Arg. – Sumatra, Java, Lesser Sunda Islands Breynia vitis-idaea (Burm.f.) C.E.C.Fisch. – China, Ryukyu Islands, Taiwan, Indochina, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, W Malaysia, Sumatra, Philippines Breynia yanhuiana
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