Dendrobium nobile
Lindl. · speciesAt a glance
Sources14 archives
Databases and archives Dendrobium nobile's data was compiled from.
WikipediaWikimedia Foundation17 languages↗
BioWikiNetmultilingual Wikipediamultilingual↗
GBIFGlobal Biodiversity Information Facility279 records↗
ENAEuropean Nucleotide Archive · EMBL-EBI55 eDNA detections↗
BOLD SystemsCentre for Biodiversity Genomics56 specimens↗
NCBIUS National Library of Medicinesequences↗
dukesphytochemcompounds
LOTUSNatural Products (Wikidata)compounds↗
NPASSNat. Product Activity & Species Sourcecompounds↗
GRIN TaxonomyUSDA-ARSdistribution & uses↗
Open Tree of LifeOpenTreephylogeny backbone↗
CCDBChromosome Counts DB · Tel Aviv U.genome & karyotype↗
GoaTGenomes on a Tree · Sangergenome & karyotype↗
PloiDBPloidy Databasegenome & karyotypeEvery layer below draws on the sources above — open one to explore it, or use ← → to move between tabs.
Dendrobium nobile, commonly known as the noble dendrobium, is a member of the family Orchidaceae. It has become a popular cultivated decorative house plant, because it produces colourful blooms in winter and spring, at a time when little else is in flower. It is also one of the 50 fundamental herbs used in traditional Chinese medicine, known as shí hú () or shí hú lán (). Dendrobium nobile is one of the most widespread ornamental members of the orchid family. Its blooms are variegated in colour, shading from white through pink and purple, and the many different cultivated varieties produce different sized and coloured blooms. Dendrobium nobile is an epiphytic or lithophytic plant native to southern China (including Tibet), the Himalayas (India, Bangladesh, Assam, Nepal, Bhutan), and Indochina (Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam).Kew World Checklist of Selected Plant FamiliesFlora of China v 25 p 381, 石斛 shi hu, Dendrobium nobile Lindley, Gen. Sp. Orchid. Pl. 79. 1830.Wood, H.P. (2006). The Dendrobiums: 1-847. A.R.G. Gantner Verlag K.G., Ruggell.Lucksom, S.Z. (2007). The orchids of Sikkim and North East Himalaya: 1-984. S.Z.Lucksom, India.Huda, M.K. (2007). An updated enumeration of the family Orchidaceae from Bangladesh. The Journal of the Orchid Society of India 21: 35-49.Raskoti, B.B. (2009). The Orchids of Nepal: 1-252. Bhakta Bahadur Raskoti and Rita Ale.Choudhary, R.K., Srivastava, R.C., Das, A.K. & Lee, J. (2012). Floristic diversity assessment and vegetation analysis of Upper Siang district of eastern Himalaya in North East India. Korean Journal of Plant Taxonomy 42: 222-246. The species is also reportedly naturalized in Hawaii.Ackerman, J.D. (2012). Orchids gone wild. Discovering naturalized orchids in Hawaii. Orchids; the Magazine of the American Orchid Society 81: 88-93. It is the state flower of Sikkim. Dendrobium nobile occurs in lowland and mountain forests, often on mossy limestone rocks. It is a tender plant that only survives winters in USDA hardiness zones 11 and above. It has strap-shaped, persistent leaves, and blooms mostly in winter and spring. It produces short, 2 to 4 flowered racemes, fragrant, waxy, and highly variable in color, arising from the upper nodes of leafed and leafless canes. Examples of the species are grown in Kew Gardens Tropical Nursery in London and seeds are stored in the Millennium Seed Bank there.
No narrative description available for this taxon yet.
Life cycle & reproduction3
Diet & foraging1
Habitat & environment8
Compounds documented for Dendrobium nobile across natural-product and food-composition databases — not just the ~150 nutrients on a classic label ("nutritional dark matter").
Compound class profile5 classes
Documented compounds303 total
| Compound | Class | Amount | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| POTASSIUM | 7,200 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| CALCIUM | 6,530 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| MAGNESIUM | 520 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| SODIUM | 156 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| IRON | 90 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| MANGANESE | 53 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| ZINC | 26 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| COPPER | 9 ppm | DukesPhytochem | |
| MERCURY | 0.05 ppm | DukesPhytochem |
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 Dendrobium nobile 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 Dendrobium nobile 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 3812×CCDB · ipcn-api-dl · CCDB · book-ipcn67-71 · CCDB · book-ipcn75-78 +2
2n 403×CCDB · ipcn-api-dl · CCDB · book-indian_vol2
2n 191×CCDB · Cave1963
n 191×CCDB · ipcn-api-dl
diploid inferred1×PloiDB · genus-scale
Sequencing statusassembly quality — how far to trust these numbers
Assembly level tells you how finished the sequence is — from fragmented contigs, through scaffolds, up to a full chromosome-level assembly. BUSCO % estimates completeness: the share of genes expected to be present that were actually found. These describe the data quality, not the organism.
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 type279 records
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 institutions18 of 32 geolocated
Institutions and collections holding physical, vouchered specimens of this species — click a row to fly to it on the map.
| Institution | Specimens |
|---|---|
| Beijing, CN | 37 |
| Saint Louis, US | 13 |
| Guilin, CN | 7 |
| Blumenau, BR | 6 |
| South Kensington, GB | 5 |
| Chengdu, CN | 5 |
| Guangzhou, CN | 4 |
| Foz do Iguaçu, BR | 4 |
| Kunming, CN | 2 |
| Université de Bordeauxlocation not on record | 2 |
| Bronx, US | 2 |
| UTFPR-CPlocation not on record | 2 |
| Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paranálocation not on record | 2 |
| Campo Mourão, BR | 1 |
| UEMlocation not on record | 1 |
| Criciúma, BR | 1 |
| Universidade de Passo Fundolocation not on record | 1 |
| Tampa, US | 1 |
| UNESClocation not on record | 1 |
| Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology (VAST)location not on record | 1 |
| Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paranálocation not on record | 1 |
| Institut fur Allgemeine Mikrobiologielocation not on record | 1 |
| Cascavel, BR | 1 |
| Chongqing Museumlocation not on record | 1 |
| UERJlocation not on record | 1 |
| UTFPR-DVlocation not on record | 1 |
| Museo naturalistico del Frignano Ferruccio Minghellilocation not on record | 1 |
| Chicago, US | 1 |
| Edinburgh, GB | 1 |
| Lake Charles, US | 1 |
| Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduraslocation not on record | 1 |
| Bangkok, TH | 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 Dendrobium nobile 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.