Solanum neoweberbaueri
2n = 3x = 36 voucher: Ochoa & Salas 11252 (CIP) (Hijmans, et al. 2007)
Central Peru (Department of Lima) in the coastal lomas, growing among rocks, often on slopes, in sandy or rocky soils, 200-750 m elevation.
Solanum neoweberbaueri is a member of Solanum sect. Petota Dumort., the tuber-bearing cultivated and wild potatoes. On a higher taxonomic level, it is a member of the informally-named Potato Clade, a group of perhaps 200-300 species that also includes the tomato and its wild relatives (Bohs, 2005).
Ochoa, C.M. 1999. Las papas de sudamerica: Peru (Parte I).
Lima, Peru: International Potato Center.
Bohs, L. 2005. Major clades in Solanum based on ndhF sequences.
Pp. 27-49 in R. C. Keating, V. C. Hollowell, & T. B. Croat (eds.), A festschrift for William G. D’Arcy: the legacy of a taxonomist. Monographs in Systematic Botany from the Missouri Botanical Garden, Vol. 104. Missouri Botanical Garden Press, St. Louis.
Hijmans, R., T. Gavrilenko, S. Stephenson, J. Bamberg, A. Salas & D.M. Spooner 2007. Geographic and environmental range expansion through polyploidy in wild potatoes (Solanum section Petota).
Global Ecol. Biogeogr. 16: 485-495.
Spooner, D.M., D. Fajardo & A. Salas 2008. Revision of the Solanum medians complex (Solanum sect. Petota).
Syst. Bot. 33: 579-588.
Solanum neoweberbaueri is similar to S. medians, but it differs by its subglabrous to sparsely pubescent leaves and calyx; the pedicels, which are typically articulate in the middle or slightly below the middle; and the corollas, which are pure white to white and mottled blue or blue to purple with a white star.
All populations of S. neoweberbaueri are sterile, never producing fruits or seeds. Ochoa (1999) postulated that S. neoweberbaueri is a sterile triploid nothospecies resulting from hybridization of S. medians, a purple-flowered species found in the lomas vegetation, and S. chancayense, a sympatric white-flowered species. Solanum neoweberbaueri is found in only a small part of the range of these two species.