Morphological and Anatomical Diversity Study on three Species of Amaranthus namely; A. hybridus L., A. viridis L. and A.spinosus L. from Rivers State, Nigeria

A study of morphological and anatomical diversity on three species of Amaranthus in the Amaranthaceae family namely; A. hybridus L., A.viridis L. and A. spinosus L. from the three senatorial district of Rivers state namely; Rivers East (upland), Rivers South East (upland) and Rivers West (coastal region) was studied to examine the diversity that exist even among similar species from different regions. Result obtained from this research showed high rate of diversity. Examination of the tran–sections of blades revealed uni–seriate epidermis, ground tissue with angular collenchyma and slender parenchyma. The vascular bundles shape had only crescent as the shape pattern. The midrib shape in cross section has three patterns in which arc, rounded and crescent bundle occurs. The examination of the petioles exhibits new and varied characters for A. viridis such as petiole shape (cross section), vascular bundles (shape, number, arrangement). While the resulted characters from the observation of the stem structure showed less variation. 52 quantitative and qualitative characters were achieved from morphological and anatomical characters and applied for construction of a dendogram using the Paleontological statistics (PAST) software which showed variation even among similar species from different senatorial district.Keywords: Amaranthus, Morphology, Anatomy, Diversity