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CharKey: An electronic identification key for wood charcoals of French Guiana


Tropical tree floras are highly diverse and many genera and species share similar anatomical patterns, making the identification of tropical wood charcoal very difficult. Appropriate tools to characterize charcoal anatomy are thus needed to facilitate and improve identification in such species-rich areas. 
This paper presents the first computer-aided identification key designed for charcoals from French Guiana, based on the wood anatomy of 507 species belonging to 274 genera and 71 families, which covers respectively 28%, 67% and 86% of the tree species, genera and families currently listed in this part of Amazonia. Species of the same genus are recorded together except those described under a synonym genus in Détienne et al. (1982) that were kept separately. As a result, the key contains 289 ‘items’ and mostly aims to identify charcoals at the genus level. It records 26 anatomical features leading to 112 feature states, almost all of which are illustrated by SEM photographs of charcoal. The descriptions were mostly taken from Détienne et al.’s guidebook on tropical woods of French Guiana (1982) and follow the IAWA list of microscopic features for hardwood identification (Wheeler et al. 1989). Some adjustments were made to a few features and those that are unrelated to charcoal identification were excluded. The whole tool, named CharKey, contains the key itself and the associated database including photographs. It can be downloaded on Figshare at https://figshare.com/s/d7d40060b53d2ad60389 (doi: 10.6084/m9.figshare.6396005). CharKey is accessible using the free software Xper2, specifically conceived for taxonomic description and computer aided-identification.