Pollen morphology identification within a plant community based on fluorescence and bright-field imaging with Optical Microscope：A case study of a Hengduan mountains alpine meadow

Pollen morphology is highly specific to each species, making it a crucial characteristic for pollen identification. Accurately identifying pollen is essential for various studies on plant classification, species evolution, and pollen transfer networks. In this study, we present the methods for pollen extraction, measurement, and feature description of pollen collected from 135 plant species belonging to 92 genera in 36 families in alpine meadow communities in the Shangri-La region of northwest Yunnan. To describe the morphological characteristics of pollen, we utilized optical microscopy fluorescence and bright-field imaging, which had not been previously employed. Furthermore, we created a comprehensive pollen image library. To prioritize the contribution values of pollen morphological features, we employed Multiple factor analysis and established a given-distance pollen retrieval table. This table enables accurate and rapid identification of pollen. Our study provides a valuable resource for establishing a fundamental pollen library for research on regional community pollination ecology, particularly in the context of pollen network transfer within the community.