Galanthus Galanthus Galanthus (snowdrop; Greek "gála" "milk", "ánthos" "flower") is a small genus of about 20 species of bulbous perennial herbaceous plants in the family Amaryllidaceae. The plants have two linear leaves and a single small white drooping bell shaped flower with six petal-like (petaloid) tepals in two circles (whorls). The smaller inner petals have green markings. Snowdrops have been known since the earliest times under various names but were named "Galanthus" in 1753. As the number of recognised species increased various attempts were made to divide the species into subgroups, usually on the basis of the pattern of the emerging
Chlamydomonas nivalis "Uredo nivalis". Over the next century, many researchers disputed over whether these organisms were lichen, plants, alga, or animal. It was not until the early 20th century when researchers finally began to agree on the algal nature of the organism and gave its currently known name, "Chlamydomonas nivalis". In 1968 "C. nivalis" was officially recognized as a collective taxon. Unfortunately, due to the lack of sequencing techniques, reliance on visually examining similarly looking snow alga, and complicated life cycle of this species, errors continued to be made in classifying this and other species of snow algae. Today, "C. nivalis" has