PLANT: Herbs, vines, shrubs, or small trees, with stellate or branched hairs, often armed with prickles, often producing alkaloids, producing no latex.

LEAVES: alternate, simple or compound, exstipulate.

FLOWERS: usually perfect, solitary or borne in cymose inflorescences; corolla sympetalous, rotate to tubular, usually 5-lobed, usually actinomorphic; stamens epipetalous, alternating with corolla lobes; anthers opening by longitudinal slits or terminal pores, distinct or united; gynoecium usually 2-carpelate, the carpels united in a usually bilocular, superior ovary.

FRUIT: a berry or capsule; seeds usually numerous.

NOTES: Ca. 85 genera, ca. 2800 species, nearly worldwide, best developed in tropical America; ca. 11 genera in AZ. Datura, is distinguished from other Solanaceae in AZ by its solitary flowers with large white to purplish-tinged corollas and spiny capsules.

REFERENCES: Bye, Robert. 2001. Solanaceae. J. Ariz. - Nev. Acad. Sci. Volume 33(1).