All of the organisms in a particular area, along with physical components of the environment such as the atmosphere, precipitation, surface water, sunlight, soil, and nutrients.
Green Plants
Land plants and green algae
Ecosystem Services
Plants add to the quality of the environment and alter the landscape to the benefit of other organisms.
Herpaticophyta (liverworts), Anthocerophyta (hornworts) and Bryophyta (mosses)
Vascular Tissue
Specialized groups of cells that conduct water from one part of the plant body to another.
Seedless Vascular Plants includes...
Include Lycophyta (lycophytes or club mosses), Psilotophyta (whisk ferns), Sphenophyta (horsetails), and Pteridophyta (ferns). They have vascular tissue but do not make seeds.
Seed plants include...
Cycadophyta (cycads), Ginkgophyta (ginkgo), Other conifers (redwoods, junipers, yews), Gnetophyta (gnetophytes), Pinophyta (pines, spruces, firs), Anthophyta (angiosperms or flowering plants). They have vascular tissue and make seeds.
Seed
An embryo and a store of nutritive tissue, surrounded by a tough protective layer.
Gymnosperm
Naked seeds or seeds that do not develop and enclosed structure (non-flowering seed plants)
Angiosperm
Encased seeds (flowering plants)
Spores
Microscopic reproductive cells with sheetlike coating
Cuticle
Sheet of waxy coating making a watertight barrier
Sporopollenin
Encases spores and pollen from modern land plants and helps them resist drying
Sporangium
Spore-producing structures
Charaphyceae
sister group to land plants (closest living relative to land plants)
Grade
Sequence of lineages that are not monophyletic
Stoma; Stomata
Opening surrounded by guard cells. When guard cells become soft, stomata closes. When guard cells are taut, stomata opens to allow CO2 to diffuse in, and O2 to diffuse out.
Lignin
Complex polymer built from six-carbon rings allowing erect stems that are resilient and capable of water-conduction.
Tracheids
Long, thin, tapering cells that have (1) a thickened, lingin-containing secondary cell wall in addition to a cellulose-based primary cell wall; and (2) gaps in the secondary cell wall, in the sides and ends of the cell, where water can flow efficiently from one tracheid to the next.
Vessel Elements
Shorter and wider than tracheids. Ends have gaps through primary and secondary cell walls.
