Cypripedium acaule
Aiton · speciesAt a glance
Sources13 archives
Databases and archives Cypripedium acaule's data was compiled from.
WikipediaWikimedia Foundation7 languages↗
BioWikiNetmultilingual Wikipediamultilingual↗
GBIFGlobal Biodiversity Information Facility44 530 records↗
ENAEuropean Nucleotide Archive · EMBL-EBI7 eDNA detections↗
BOLD SystemsCentre for Biodiversity Genomics9 specimens↗
NCBIUS National Library of Medicinesequences↗
LOTUSNatural Products (Wikidata)compounds↗
GRIN TaxonomyUSDA-ARSdistribution & uses↗
Open Tree of LifeOpenTreephylogeny backbone↗
CCDBChromosome Counts DB · Tel Aviv U.genome & karyotype↗
PloiDBPloidy Databasegenome & karyotype
WikidataWikimedia Foundationstructured facts↗
GLoBIGlobal Biotic Interactionsbiotic interactions↗Every layer below draws on the sources above — open one to explore it, or use ← → to move between tabs.
Cypripedium acaule is a species of flowering plant in the orchid family Orchidaceae. It is commonly referred to as the pink lady's slipper or moccasin flower. The specific epithet acaule means "lacking an obvious stem", a reference to its short underground stem, for which reason the plant is also known as the stemless lady's-slipper. It is the provincial flower of Prince Edward Island, Canada and the state wildflower of New Hampshire, United States.
No narrative description available for this taxon yet.
Size & morphology6
Life cycle & reproduction4
Diet & foraging1
Habitat & environment6
Physiology & chemistry5
Other traits1
Compounds documented for Cypripedium acaule across natural-product and food-composition databases — not just the ~150 nutrients on a classic label ("nutritional dark matter").
Compound class profile5 classes
Documented compounds8 total
| Compound | Class | Amount | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| (3S,4aR,6aR,6aR,6bR,8aR,12S,12aS,14aR,14bR)-4,4,6a,6b,8a,12,14b-heptamethyl-11-methylidene-1,2,3,4a,5,6,6a,7,8,9,10,12,12a,13,14,14a-hexadecahydropicen-3-ol | present | LOTUS | |
| Alpha-Amyrin | present | LOTUS | |
| beta-Amyrin | present | LOTUS | |
| beta-Sitosterol | present | LOTUS | |
| Campesterol | present | LOTUS | |
| Lupeol | present | LOTUS | |
| Stigmasterol | present | LOTUS | |
| Taraxasterol | present | LOTUS |
A DNA barcode is a short, standardised stretch of genes that works like a fingerprint — enough to tell one species from another. Below is the molecular trace Cypripedium acaule has left across the world's sequence archives.
At a glance
★ the standard DNA barcode for this group — the short region actually read to tell this species apart. The rest are extra genes sequenced along the way.
The complete instruction manual Cypripedium acaule carries — its genome. We read it from three angles — how big it is, how the DNA is packed into chromosomes, and how completely it has been sequenced — and explain how to read each value as you go.
Genome sizehow big the whole instruction manual is
Measured in base pairs (bp) — the individual letters of DNA (human ≈ 3.2 Gb, a bacterium a few million). The chart places this genome on a logarithmic scale — each step to the right is ten times bigger — among reference organisms. Across species a bigger genome loosely tracks with larger cells, slower growth and lower-energy lifestyles (powered flight favours small genomes) — yet it does not imply more genes or a more advanced organism (the long-standing C-value paradox).
Chromosomes & ploidyhow the DNA is packaged
2n is the full chromosome count in a normal body cell; n is a gamete (egg or sperm), which carries half. Ploidy is how many complete chromosome sets each cell holds — 2× (diploid) is typical for animals, while higher levels (polyploidy) are common in plants. Click any value below to see the underlying records and sources.
2n 205×CCDB · ipcn-api-dl · CCDB · book-ipcn67-71 · CCDB · eflora +1
diploid inferred1×PloiDB · genus-scale
How far back this lineage goes — and how we know. Everything here is measured in Ma, short for “mega-annum”: millions of years ago. The chart reads left to right like a calendar of the Earth, from the deep past on the left to today at the right edgetop to bottom like a core drilled through the Earth, from the deep past at the top down to today at the bottom.
At a glance
When this lineage existed
How to read this: the coloured strip along the bottomdown the left is the geological calendar — the standard epochs (Pliocene, Pleistocene…) every museum uses, shown so you can see which chapter of Earth's history this lineage lived in. This lineage is a young one, so the strip is zoomed in to epochs — the finer subdivisions inside a period. The orange marker is the DNA clock: DNA accumulates mutations at a roughly steady rate, so comparing this species' DNA with its relatives estimates when the lineage split off — independently of any fossil.
Record type44 530 records
Origin
Range
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Museum / Voucheredphysical evidence
Backed by a physical specimen — a herbarium sheet, sample or voucher held in a collection. “Vouchered” means supported by material evidence, not just an observation.
Cultivated / Captivenot free-living
A living individual in a botanical garden, zoo or nursery — cultivated or kept, not free-living.
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Holding institutions69 of 92 geolocated
Institutions and collections holding physical, vouchered specimens of this species — click a row to fly to it on the map.
| Institution | Specimens |
|---|---|
| Philadelphia, US | 485 |
| Chongqing Museumlocation not on record | 271 |
| Madison, US | 193 |
| Québec, CA | 160 |
| Université Lavallocation not on record | 147 |
| Chicago, US | 110 |
| Acadia Universitylocation not on record | 93 |
| Ann Arbor, US | 86 |
| Toronto, CA | 86 |
| New Haven, US | 85 |
| College Park, US | 72 |
| Montréal, CA | 64 |
| Saint John, CA | 56 |
| Bronx, US | 53 |
| Museo civico La Terra e l'Uomo di Crocetta del Montellolocation not on record | 42 |
| Chapel Hill, US | 35 |
| Wuzhou, CN | 25 |
| Vancouver, CA | 25 |
| Montréal, CA | 23 |
| Allentown, US | 20 |
| WINlocation not on record | 20 |
| Claremont, US | 15 |
| Millersville, US | 14 |
| Green Bay, US | 12 |
| University of Alberta Museumslocation not on record | 11 |
| Fort Worth, US | 10 |
| Tampa, US | 10 |
| Cambridge, US | 9 |
| Bangkok, TH | 9 |
| University of Wisconsinlocation not on record | 8 |
| Davenport, US | 7 |
| Whitewater, US | 7 |
| DOI/NPS, Greenbelt Parklocation not on record | 6 |
| Dekalb, US | 6 |
| Tuscaloosa, US | 5 |
| Morgantown, US | 5 |
| University of Winnipeglocation not on record | 5 |
| Columbia, US | 5 |
| Saint Louis, US | 4 |
| Dresden, DE | 3 |
| Austin, US | 3 |
| Paris, FR | 3 |
| AUAlocation not on record | 3 |
| Philadelphia, US | 3 |
| Missoula, US | 3 |
| University of Tennessee at Chattanoogalocation not on record | 2 |
| Washington, US | 2 |
| Riverside, US | 2 |
| Long Beach, US | 2 |
| Oskarshamn, SE | 2 |
| Boise, US | 2 |
| US | 2 |
| Harvard Universitylocation not on record | 2 |
| Uppsala, SE | 2 |
| Fullerton, US | 2 |
| Trois-Rivières, CA | 2 |
| Provo, US | 2 |
| Northridge, US | 2 |
| Christchurch, NZ | 2 |
| San Jose State University, Museum of Birds and Mammalslocation not on record | 2 |
| Salvador, BR | 2 |
| Chicago, US | 2 |
| Staten Island, US | 2 |
| Bloomington, US | 2 |
| Burlington, US | 2 |
| Denver, US | 2 |
| GAlocation not on record | 2 |
| McWane Science Centerlocation not on record | 1 |
| Hudson, US | 1 |
| Whitehorse, CA | 1 |
| DOI/NPS, Little Rock Central High School National Historic Sitelocation not on record | 1 |
| ASUlocation not on record | 1 |
| San Diego, US | 1 |
| UFBAlocation not on record | 1 |
| DOI/NPS, Mississippi National River & Recreation Arealocation not on record | 1 |
| Philadelphia, US | 1 |
| San Luis Obispo, US | 1 |
| Knoxville, US | 1 |
| Universite de Montreal, L'Herbier Marie-Victorinlocation not on record | 1 |
| University of Guelph, OAC Herbariumlocation not on record | 1 |
| Florida Museum of Natural History- Zoology, Paleontology & Paleobotanylocation not on record | 1 |
| Clemson, US | 1 |
| Macomb, US | 1 |
| Flagstaff, US | 1 |
| Mount Pleasant, US | 1 |
| New Brunswick, US | 1 |
| Ypsilanti, US | 1 |
| Miami, US | 1 |
| CEPLAClocation not on record | 1 |
| South Kensington, GB | 1 |
| Santa Barbara, US | 1 |
| Lubbock, US | 1 |
Cultivated / Captivenot free-living
A living individual in a botanical garden, zoo or nursery — cultivated or kept, not free-living.
Where the DNA of Cypripedium acaule was picked up in samples of water, soil or air — nobody saw the organism, only its DNA left behind. A trace is a clue that the species was near, not a confirmed sighting.
Signal
Where its DNA was found
How strong is each trace?
Modelled climatemodelled
How to read this: each dot is one detection of this species' DNA in an environmental sample. The confidence meter weighs how many independent studies and places back up the signal — one detection in one study is a hint; many across several studies is solid. Records dated before 2008 (when eDNA methods began) are treated as likely mislabeled and left off the map.