Annuals or perennials [biennials, subshrubs]; not scapose; trichomes sessile, stellate, with 2-6 minute basal branches (branches as many as 3-25), rays branched or not, sometimes trichomes simple [lepidote]. Stems erect, ascending, or decumbent, unbranched or branched. Leaves basal and cauline; petiolate or sessile; basal rosulate or not, petiolate or sessile, blade margins entire; cauline petiolate or sessile, blade (base cuneate or attenuate), margins entire. Racemes (few-to several-flowered, sometimes corymbose or paniculate). Fruiting pedicels ascending, divaricate, or reflexed, slender or stout. Flowers: sepals ovate or oblong, lateral pair not saccate; petals yellow or white [rarely pink], suborbicular, spatulate, oblanceolate, linear-oblanceolate, or, obovate (apex obtuse or emarginate); stamens tetradynamous; filaments not winged, uni-or bilaterally winged, appendaged, or toothed; anthers ovate or oblong; nectar glands (4), 1 on each side of lateral stamen, median glands absent; (placentation apical or parietal). Fruits sessile, ovate-oblong, obovate, or elliptic [obcordate, rarely globose], usually strongly flattened, latiseptate, rarely inflated; valves each not veined (smooth), pubescent or glabrous; replum (visible), rounded; septum complete, (membranous, translucent, veinless); ovules 1 or 2 [or 4-8] per ovary; stigma capitate. Seeds biseriate or aseriate, flattened, winged or not, orbicular or suborbicular to ovoid; seed coat (smooth or minutely reticulate), mucilaginous or not when wetted; cotyledons accumbent or incumbent.
Annual to perennial, taprooted herbs. Hairs branched or stellate, rarely mixed with unbranched hairs, rarely scaly. Stems decumbent to erect, leafy. Lvs simple; margin entire. Racemes ebracteate. Sepals erecto-patent, not saccate. Petals yellow, entire, emarginate or 2-fid. Stamens 6, usually appendaged. Lateral nectaries 4, rounded to filiform on both sides of short stamens; median nectaries 0. Style short; stigma capitate or emarginate. Silicle orbicular or obovate, usually emarginate, inflated or flat, latiseptate, dehiscent; valves usually not veined or with faint median vein. Seeds flattened, usually winged, 1-2-(6) per locule, loosely arranged.
Pet yellow, varying to white, gradually narrowed to the base; short filaments flanked by a single gland on each side; anthers short and blunt; ovary short, compressed; ovules 1–8 per locule; style slender but short; fr elliptic to orbicular, flattened parallel to the septum, each locule with a few seeds; herbs with entire or serrate lvs; ± pubescent with stellate hairs. 170, mainly Eurasia.
Annual herbs, hoary-tomentose. Sepals equal. Petals clawed. Stamens appendiculate. Nectariferous glands semiglobular, triangular or filiform on both sides of short stamens. Stigma capitate or emarginate. Silicula dehiscent, latisept, without prominent veins. Seeds 4–6 per locule, winged.