Abstract
During the course of Botanical expedition to the Mongolian and Russian Altai in 2007 and 2008, seven species of Allium were collected in eight sites and studied cytologically. Allium altaicum, A. austrosibilicum, A. senescens and A. vodopjanovae had the common chromosome number of 2n=16 (diploid), while A. nutans had that of 2n=32 (tetraploid), A. eduardii had that of 2n=16 (diploid), 17 and 32 (tetraploid) and A. rubens had 2n=16 (diploid) and 17. The common chromosome number of 2n=17 in A. eduardii and A. rubens could be aneuploidy due to karyomorphological behaviors of chromatins at the stages of resting, mitotic prophase and prometaphase. These findings of aneuploid were new to Allium,/I>. Moreover, the karyotypes of the above six diploid species were characterized by: (1) The largest chromosomes of 12.2 to 14.4 μm, and the smallest chromosomes of 5.9 to 7.4 μm; (2) Very less differences in relative lengths of the chromosomes and chromosome constitutions with respect to arm ratio not seen much differences among those chromosomes; (3) The karyotype formulas of 2n=16=12m+2sm+2st for A. altaicum; 2n=16=14m+2sm for A. austrosibilicum, A. rubens, and A. senescens; 2n=17=14m+2sm+1st for A. rubens aneuploid form; 2n=16=14m+2st for A. eduardii; 2n=17=14m+3st for A. eduardii aneuploid form; 2n=16=9m+5sm+2t for A. vodopjanovae.
