Mimosoideae

Recent work on phylogenetic relationships has found that the Mimosoideae form a clade nested with subfamily Caesalpinioideae, and the most recent classification by The Legume Phylogeny Working Group refers to them as the Mimosoid clade within subfamily Caesalpinioideae. The group includes about 40 genera and 2,500 species. Some classification systems, for example the Cronquist system, treat the Fabaceae in a narrow sense, raising the Mimisoideae to the rank of family as Mimosaceae. The Angiosperm Phylogeny Group treats Fabaceae in the broad sense. The Mimosoideae were historically subdivided into four tribes (Acacieae, Ingeae, Mimoseae, and Mimozygantheae). However, modern molecular phylogenetics has shown that these groupings were artificial. Several informal subgroups have been proposed, but not yet described formally as tribes. Additionally, the genus Acacia was recently segregated into five genera (Acacia sensu stricto, Acaciella, Mariosousa, Senegalia, and Vachellia).