Abstract
DATA are used to re-assess the relationships between certain species of the genus Launaea Cass. belonging to the family Asteraccae. Taxonomic diversity of 10 taxa belonging to 8 species and 2 subspecies of Launaea Cass. is provided using morphological criteria concerned with vegetative and reproductive organs in addition to FTIR spectroscopy. Ecofriendly silver nanoparticles were synthesized from Launaeas capitula extract and characterized by FTIR spectroscopy. NTSYS-pc software was used in order to analyze the data of FTIR spectroscopy and morphological characters. FTIR technique was used to recognize the functional groups of the active compound according to the peak value in Infrared radiation region. Cluster analysis based on FTIR data divided the ten studied taxa into three major groups; the first group comprises the four species of sect. Microrhynchus (L. nudicaulis, L. intvbacea and L. massauensis) and sect. Launaea (L. capitata), the second group comprises the four subspecies of L. angustifolia and L. fnagilis; the third group comprises the two-allied species (L. mucronata and L. cassiniana). FTIR technique found to be a rapid and accurate method for differentiating between Launaea taxa under investigation.