Gleicheniales

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title: "Gleicheniales" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["gleicheniales", "fern-orders"] description: "Order of ferns" topic_path: "general/gleicheniales" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleicheniales" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Order of ferns ::

| fossil_range = | image = Dipteris conjugata 破傘蕨 001 (天問).jpg | image_caption = Dipteris conjugata of the Dipteridaceae | taxon = Gleicheniales | authority = Schimp. | subdivision_ranks = Families | subdivision =

• Dipteridaceae
• Gleicheniaceae
• Matoniaceae | synonyms =
• Gleicheniatae
• Gleicheniopsida (but see text)

Gleicheniales is an order of ferns in the subclass Polypodiidae (the leptosporangiate ferns). The Gleicheniales has spore records potentially as early as the Early Carboniferous, but the oldest unambiguous macrofossil records date to the Early Permian.

Description

These ferns are characterized by root steles having 3–5 protoxylem poles and antheridia with 6–12 narrow, twisted or curved cells in their walls, Gleichenia-type spore wall ultrastructure. Otherwise, their habitus is highly diverse, including plants with the typical fern fronds, others whose leaves resemble those of palm trees, and yet others again which have undivided leaves. They are tropical ferns, most diverse in Asia and the Pacific region.

Classification

In the molecular phylogenetic classification of Smith et al. in 2006, the Gleicheniales were placed in class Polypodiopsida (the leptosporangiate ferns). Three families, Dipteridaceae, Gleicheniaceae, and Matoniaceae were recognized. The linear sequence of Christenhusz et al. (2011), intended for compatibility with the classification of Chase and Reveal (2009) which placed all land plants in Equisetopsida, reclassified Smith's Polypodiopsida as subclass Polypodiidae and placed the Gleicheniales there. The circumscription of the order and its families was not changed, and that circumscription and placement in Polypodiidae has subsequently been followed in the classifications of Christenhusz and Chase (2014) and PPG I (2016).

The fossil taxon Microphyllopteris is used for some Mesozoic Gleicheniales that cannot be reliably assigned to the present-day orders. The Triassic Antarctipteris and Gleichenipteris are sometimes ascribed to the Gleicheniaceae, but are probably better considered Gleicheniales incertae sedis.

In historical treatments, the order has sometimes been treated as a subclass Gleicheniatae of the Pteridopsida, with the taxa treated as families here upranked to orders, so that a distinct subclass can be established for the leptosporangiate ferns. In other treatments, they were expanded to include the filmy ferns (order Hymenophyllales), as well as the similar-looking genus Hymenophyllopsis (as order Hymenophyllopsidales). The resultant group was treated as class Gleichenopsida alongside the Pteridopsida, which would then be limited to the leptosporangiate ferns. However, this class is not monophyletic but rather a basal grade, retaining ancient traits among the living ferns. Irrespective of their modern taxonomic treatment, the Gleicheniales were formerly included in the order Polypodiales. But the ferns in the loose sense are much too diverse a group to be shoehorned into one taxon at such a low rank.

::data[format=table]

Lehtonen 2011, Choo & Escapa 2018	Nitta et al. 2022
	label1=Gleicheniales
::

Footnotes

References

• (2006): A classification for extant ferns. Taxon 55(3): 705–731. PDF fulltext

References

1. (June 2024). "Maiaspora: the hallmark of gleichenioid ferns (Gleicheniales) from the early Carboniferous". Papers in Palaeontology.
2. (August 2006). "A classification for extant ferns". Taxon.
3. (18 February 2011). "A linear sequence of extant families and genera of lycophytes and ferns". [[Phytotaxa]].
4. (October 2009). "A phylogenetic classification of the land plants to accompany APG III". Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society.
5. (13 February 2014). "Trends and concepts in fern classification". Annals of Botany.
6. The Pteridophyte Phylogeny Group. (November 2016). "A community-derived classification for extant lycophytes and ferns". Journal of Systematics and Evolution.
7. (November 2021). "A 298-million-year-old gleicheniaceous fern from China". Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology.
8. Samuli Lehtonen. (2011). "Towards Resolving the Complete Fern Tree of Life". PLOS ONE.
9. (2018). "Assessing the evolutionary history of the fern family Dipteridaceae (Gleicheniales) by incorporating both extant and extinct members in a combined phylogenetic study". American Journal of Botany.
10. (2022). "An Open and Continuously Updated Fern Tree of Life". Frontiers in Plant Science.
11. (2024). "Tree viewer: interactive visualization of FTOL".

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