Armen Takhtajan is among the greatest authorities in the world on the evolution of plants. This book culminates almost sixty years of the scientist's research of the origin and classification of the flowering plants. It presents a continuation of Dr. Takhtajan's earlier publications including 'Systema Magnoliophytorum' (1987), (in Russian), and 'Diversity and Classification of Flowering Plants' (1997), (in English). In his latest book, the author presents a concise and significantly revised system of plant classification ('Takhtajan system') based on the most recent studies in plant morphology, embryology, phytochemistry, cytology, molecular biology and palynology. Flowering plants are divided into two classes: class Magnoliopsida (or Dicotyledons) includes 8 subclasses, 126 orders, c. 440 families, almost 10,500 genera, and no less than 195,000 species; and class Liliopsida (or Monocotyledons) includes 4 subclasses, 31 orders, 120 families, more than 3,000 genera, and about 65,000 species.This book contains a detailed description of plant orders, and descriptive keys to plant families providing characteristic features of the families and their differences.

The author is one of the greatest botanists of the 20^th century who was awarded 'The Henry Allan Gleason Award' by the New York Botanical Garden  for the book 'Diversity and Classification of Flowering Plants' (1997). Citation: This work, which is a complete classification of the angiosperms to the genus level, is the culmination of over sixty years of research in botany focusing on flowering plants systematics and phytogeography.