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The Rutaceae () is a family, commonly known as the rue RUTACEAE in BoDD – Botanical Dermatology Database or citrus family, of , usually placed in the order Sapindales.
Species of the family generally have that divide into four or five parts, usually with strong scents. They range in form and size from Herbaceous plant to and large .
The most economically important genus in the family is Citrus, which includes the orange ( C. × sinensis), lemon ( C. × limon), grapefruit ( C. × paradisi), and lime (various). Boronia is a large Australian genus, some members of which are plants with highly fragrant flowers and are used in commercial Essential oil production. Other large genera include Zanthoxylum, several species of which are cultivated for Sichuan pepper, Melicope, and Agathosma. The family Rutaceae contains about 160 genus.
Flowers are , solitary or in Inflorescence, rarely in raceme, and mainly Pollination by insects. They are Floral symmetry or (rarely) laterally symmetric and generally plant sexuality. They have four or five—sometimes three—mostly separate and and eight to ten stamen (five in Skimmia, many in Citrus), usually separate or in several groups. Usually they have only a single stigma with 2 to 5 united . Their ovaries are sometimes separate, but their styles are combined.
The fruit of the Rutaceae are very variable: berries, , hesperidium, samaras, capsules, and follicles all occur. Seed number also varies widely.
Molecular methods have shown that only Aurantioideae can be clearly differentiated from other members of the family based on fruit. They have not supported the circumscriptions of Engler's three other main subfamilies. In 2012, Groppo et al. divided Rutaceae into only two subfamilies, retaining Cneoroideae but placing all the remaining genera in a greatly enlarged subfamily Rutoideae s.l. A 2014 classification by Morton and Telmer also retained Engler's Aurantioideae, but split the remaining Rutoideae s.l. into a smaller Rutoideae and a much larger Amyridoideae s.l., containing most of Engler's Rutoideae. Until 2021, molecular phylogenetic methods had only sampled between 20% and 40% of the genera of Rutaceae. A 2021 study by Appelhans et al. sampled almost 90% of the genera. The two main recognized by Groppo et al. in 2012 were upheld, but Morton and Telmer's Rutoideae was Paraphyly and their Amyridoideae was Polyphyly and did not include the type genus. Applehans et al. divided the family into six subfamilies, shown below in the cladogram produced in their study. The large subfamily Zanthoxyloideae was shown to contain distinct clades, but the authors considered that a revised classification at the tribal level was not yet feasible at the time their paper was published.
Non-citrus fruits include the white sapote ( Casimiroa edulis), orangeberry ( Glycosmis pentaphylla), limeberry ( Triphasia trifolia), and the Aegle marmelos ( Aegle marmelos).
The curry tree, Murraya koenigii, is of culinary importance in the Indian subcontinent and elsewhere, as its leaves are used as a spice to flavour dishes. Spices are also made from a number of species in the genus Zanthoxylum, notably Sichuan pepper.
Other plants are grown in horticulture: Murraya and Skimmia species, for example. Ruta, Zanthoxylum and Casimiroa species are Herbalism. Several plants are also used by the perfume industry, such as the Western Australian Boronia megastigma.
The genus Pilocarpus has species ( P. jaborandi, and P. microphyllus from Brazil, and P. pennatifolius from Paraguay) from which the medicine pilocarpine, used to treat glaucoma, is extracted.
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