Roupala

Roupala is a Neotropical genus of woody shrubs and trees in the plant family Proteaceae. Its 34 species are generally found in forests from sea level to 4,000 m (13,000 ft) altitude from Mexico to Argentina.

The genus was described by Jean Baptiste Christophore Fusée Aublet in 1775, its name derived from a local name roupale in French Guiana.

In their 1975 monograph on the Proteaceae, Lawrie Johnson and Barbara Briggs placed it in a subtribe Roupalinae alongside the New Caledonian genus Kermadecia as the genera had similar floral parts and leaves. Both taxa also have 14 chromosome pairs.

In 2006, the family's classification was redefined using molecular data. Here, Roupala emerged as a sister to the genera Orites and Neorites, with Knightia as the next most closely related taxon, while Kermadecia was not related. They thus placed the first three genera in the subtribe Roupalinae, conceding that the next closest relatives of this group is unclear. This group lies within the subfamily Grevilleoideae.

The genus likely originated in Gondwana before South America split away around 110 million years ago, and then spread into Central America in the Miocene around six million years ago when the Americas came into contact with each other. Clock dating with molecular and fossil data indicated ancestors of the genus may have split from Neorites in the mid-Oligocene around 30 million years ago, and that this lineage in turn separated from the ancestors of Orites in the late Eocene around 36 million years ago.

Ten species are threatened, principally by habitat destruction. Four of these (R. barnettiae, R. percoriacea, R. thomesiana and R. tobagensis) are only known from a single collection of each species, as is Roupala gertii, newly described in 2012.

The genus includes the following species: with a 34th species being described by Prance in 2012.

The species are woody shrubs or trees to 25 m (80 ft) high, often with hairy new growth. The leaves are compound or deeply lobed in younger plants, but are usually simple in mature plants. The flowers occur in racemes, known as inflorescences, and are followed by follicles containing one or two seeds. Accord to Prance and colleagues, Roupala species were "almost certainly" pollinated by insects, and have wind- and water-dispersed seeds (the latter being common in Amazonian forests subject to annual flooding).