Annual herbs, glabrous, sometimes viscid below, branched mostly from the base with ± ascending branches. Leaves fleshy, glabrous; lower obovate-oblong, sinuate-dentate, shortly stalked; upper oblong or linear, subsessile or sessile with rounded or obtuse apex. Racemes corymbose, becoming lax in fruit, ebracteate. Flowers small, whitish or pale lilac; pedicels long, filiform, spreading or pendent in fruit. Sepals suberect, subequal, inner broad, hardly saccate at the base. Petals about twice as long as the sepals, obovate, cuneate at the base, apex ± rounded. Stamens 6; filaments simple, linear; anthers oblong, obtuse. Lateral nectar glands short, bilobed; middle semiglobose. Ovary ellipsoid, 20-30-ovuled; gynophore present, short. Siliculae broadly ellipsoid or somewhat oblong, compressed; lower part (forming the body of silicula) bilocular, dehiscent with a distinct mid-vein and reticulate venation on the valves, many seeded; upper part (beak) much shorter and narrow, style-like, sterile, with a mid groove and short depressed capitate sub-bilobed stigma; septum membranous with a distinct mid-vein and reticulate venation; seeds biseriate, brown, ovoid, conspicuously white winged; cotyledons conduplicate.
Only 2 desert species, one confined to N. Africa and the other of wide distribution, from N. Africa, Egypt, Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan to W. Pakis¬tan.
