.ccmerino

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Cineraria is now generally treated as a genus of about 50 species of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae, native to southern Africa. The genus includes herbaceous plants and small subshrubs. In the past, the genus was commonly viewed in a broader sense including a number of species from the Canary Islands and Madeira which are now transferred to the genus Pericallis, including the Florist's Cineraria (Pericallis x hybrida). Amongst the uses for Cineraria include topical application for the treatment of cataracts. Senecioneae is the largest tribe of the Asteraceae, or the sunflower family, comprising approximately 150 genera and 3,000 species. Almost one-third of the species in this tribe are placed in the genus Senecio.[1] Its members exhibit probably the widest possible range of form to be found anywhere in the entire plant kingdom and include annuals, minute creeping alpines, perennial herbs, shrubs, climbers, succulents, trees and semi-aquatic plants.[2]. Plants in this tribe are responsible for more livestock poisonings than all other plants combined.[3] The poisons are particularly pyrrolizidine alkaloids in Senecio[3] and furanoeremophilanes in Tetradymia[2].