Plant anatomy or phytotomy is the general term for the study of the internal structure of plants. Originally, it included plant morphology, the description of the physical form and external structure of plants, but since the mid-20th century, plant anatomy has been considered a separate field referring only to internal plant structure. [1] [2] Plant anatomy is now frequently investigated at the cellular level, and often involves the sectioning of tissues and microscopy. [3]
Some studies of plant anatomy use a systems approach, organized on the basis of the plant's activities, such as nutrient transport, flowering, pollination, embryogenesis or seed development. [4] Others are more classically [5] divided into the following structural categories:
About 300 BC, Theophrastus wrote a number of plant treatises, only two of which survive, Enquiry into Plants (Περὶ φυτῶν ἱστορία), and On the Causes of Plants (Περὶ φυτῶν αἰτιῶν). He developed concepts of plant morphology and classification, which did not withstand the scientific scrutiny of the Renaissance.
A Swiss physician and botanist, Gaspard Bauhin, introduced binomial nomenclature into plant taxonomy. He published Pinax theatri botanici in 1596, which was the first to use this convention for naming of species. His criteria for classification included natural relationships, or 'affinities', which in many cases were structural.
It was in the late 1600s that plant anatomy became refined into a modern science. Italian doctor and microscopist, Marcello Malpighi, was one of the two founders of plant anatomy. In 1671, he published his Anatomia Plantarum, the first major advance in plant physiogamy since Aristotle. The other founder was the British doctor Nehemiah Grew. He published An Idea of a Philosophical History of Plants in 1672 and The Anatomy of Plants in 1682. Grew is credited with the recognition of plant cells, although he called them 'vesicles' and 'bladders'. He correctly identified and described the sexual organs of plants (flowers) and their parts. [6]
In the eighteenth century, Carl Linnaeus established taxonomy based on structure, and his early work was with plant anatomy. While the exact structural level which is to be considered to be scientifically valid for comparison and differentiation has changed with the growth of knowledge, the basic principles were established by Linnaeus. He published his master work, Species Plantarum in 1753.
In 1802, French botanist Charles-François Brisseau de Mirbel, published Traité d'anatomie et de physiologie végétale (Treatise on Plant Anatomy and Physiology) establishing the beginnings of the science of plant cytology.
In 1812, Johann Jacob Paul Moldenhawer published Beyträge zur Anatomie der Pflanzen, describing microscopic studies of plant tissues.
In 1813, a Swiss botanist, Augustin Pyrame de Candolle, published Théorie élémentaire de la botanique , in which he argued that plant anatomy, not physiology, ought to be the sole basis for plant classification. Using a scientific basis, he established structural criteria for defining and separating plant genera.
In 1830, Franz Meyen published Phytotomie, the first comprehensive review of plant anatomy.
In 1838, German botanist Matthias Jakob Schleiden, published Contributions to Phytogenesis, stating, "the lower plants all consist of one cell, while the higher plants are composed of (many) individual cells" thus confirming and continuing Mirbel's work.
A German-Polish botanist, Eduard Strasburger, described the mitotic process in plant cells and further demonstrated that new cell nuclei can only arise from the division of other pre-existing nuclei. His Studien über Protoplasma was published in 1876.
Gottlieb Haberlandt, a German botanist, studied plant physiology and classified plant tissue based upon function. On this basis, in 1884, he published Physiologische Pflanzenanatomie (Physiological Plant Anatomy), in which he described twelve types of tissue systems (absorptive, mechanical, photosynthetic, etc.).
British paleobotanists Dunkinfield Henry Scott and William Crawford Williamson described the structures of fossilized plants at the end of the nineteenth century. Scott's Studies in Fossil Botany was published in 1900.
Following Charles Darwin's Origin of Species a Canadian botanist, Edward Charles Jeffrey, who was studying the comparative anatomy and phylogeny of different vascular plant groups, applied the theory to plants using the form and structure of plants to establish a number of evolutionary lines. He published his The Anatomy of Woody Plants in 1917.
The growth of comparative plant anatomy was spearheaded by British botanist Agnes Arber. She published Water Plants: A Study of Aquatic Angiosperms in 1920, Monocotyledons: A Morphological Study in 1925, and The Gramineae: A Study of Cereal, Bamboo and Grass in 1934. [7]
Following World War II, Katherine Esau published, Plant Anatomy (1953), which became the definitive textbook on plant structure in North American universities and elsewhere, it was still in print as of 2006. [8] She followed up with her Anatomy of seed plants in 1960.
Botany, also called plant science, plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek word βοτάνη meaning "pasture", "herbs" "grass", or "fodder"; βοτάνη is in turn derived from βόσκειν, "to feed" or "to graze". Traditionally, botany has also included the study of fungi and algae by mycologists and phycologists respectively, with the study of these three groups of organisms remaining within the sphere of interest of the International Botanical Congress. Nowadays, botanists study approximately 410,000 species of land plants of which some 391,000 species are vascular plants, and approximately 20,000 are bryophytes.
Biology – The natural science that studies life. Areas of focus include structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy.
Phloem is the living tissue in vascular plants that transports the soluble organic compounds made during photosynthesis and known as photosynthates, in particular the sugar sucrose, to the rest of the plant. This transport process is called translocation. In trees, the phloem is the innermost layer of the bark, hence the name, derived from the Ancient Greek word φλοιός (phloiós), meaning "bark". The term was introduced by Carl Nägeli in 1858. Different types of phloem can be distinguished. The early phloem formed in the growth apices is called protophloem. Protophloem eventually becomes obliterated once it connects to the durable phloem in mature organs, the metaphloem. Further, secondary phloem is formed during the thickening of stem structures.
In biology, tissue is an assembly of similar cells and their extracellular matrix from the same embryonic origin that together carry out a specific function. Tissues occupy a biological organizational level between cells and a complete organ. Accordingly, organs are formed by the functional grouping together of multiple tissues.
In cell biology, the meristem is a type of tissue found in plants. It consists of undifferentiated cells capable of cell division. Cells in the meristem can develop into all the other tissues and organs that occur in plants. These cells continue to divide until they become differentiated and lose the ability to divide.
A lenticel is a porous tissue consisting of cells with large intercellular spaces in the periderm of the secondarily thickened organs and the bark of woody stems and roots of gymnosperms and dicotyledonous flowering plants. It functions as a pore, providing a pathway for the direct exchange of gases between the internal tissues and atmosphere through the bark, which is otherwise impermeable to gases. The name lenticel, pronounced with an, derives from its lenticular (lens-like) shape. The shape of lenticels is one of the characteristics used for tree identification.
Sclereids are a reduced form of sclerenchyma cells with highly thickened, lignified cellular walls that form small bundles of durable layers of tissue in most plants. The presence of numerous sclereids form the cores of apples and produce the gritty texture of guavas.
The Casparian strip is a band-like thickening in the center of the root endodermis of vascular plants. The composition of the region is mainly suberin, lignin and some structural proteins, which are capable of reducing the diffusive apoplastic flow of water and solutes into the stele and its width varies between species. The Casparian strip is impervious to water so can control the transportation of water and inorganic salts between the cortex and the vascular bundle, preventing water and inorganic salts from being transported to the stele through the apoplast, so that it must enter the cell membrane and move to the stele through the symplastic pathway, blocking the internal and external objects of the cell. The function of mass transportation are similar to that of animal tissues.. The development of the Casparian strip is regulated by transcription factors such as SHORT-ROOT (SHR), SCARECROW (SCR) and MYB36, as well as polypeptide hormone synthesised by midcolumn cells.
Charles-François Brisseau de Mirbel was a French botanist and politician. He was a founder of the science of plant cytology.
The ground tissue of plants includes all tissues that are neither dermal nor vascular. It can be divided into three types based on the nature of the cell walls. This tissue system is present between the dermal tissue and forms the main bulk of the plant body.
Katherine Esau was a pioneering German-American botanist who studied plant anatomy and the effects of viruses. Her books Plant Anatomy and Anatomy of Seed Plants are key texts. In 1989, Esau received the National Medal of Science "In recognition of her distinguished service to the American community of plant biologists, and for the excellence of her pioneering research, both basic and applied, on plant structure and development, which has spanned more than six decades; for her superlative performance as an educator, in the classroom and through her books; for the encouragement and inspiration she has given to a legion of young, aspiring plant biologists; and for providing a special role model for women in science." When Katherine Esau died in year 1997. Peter Raven 'Director of Anatomy and Morphology' of 'Missouri Botanical Garden' remembered that she absolutely dominated the field of plant Biology even at the age of 99.
In botany, secondary growth is the growth that results from cell division in the cambia or lateral meristems and that causes the stems and roots to thicken, while primary growth is growth that occurs as a result of cell division at the tips of stems and roots, causing them to elongate, and gives rise to primary tissue. Secondary growth occurs in most seed plants, but monocots usually lack secondary growth. If they do have secondary growth, it differs from the typical pattern of other seed plants.
Phytomorphology is the study of the physical form and external structure of plants. This is usually considered distinct from plant anatomy, which is the study of the internal structure of plants, especially at the microscopic level. Plant morphology is useful in the visual identification of plants. Recent studies in molecular biology started to investigate the molecular processes involved in determining the conservation and diversification of plant morphologies. In these studies transcriptome conservation patterns were found to mark crucial ontogenetic transitions during the plant life cycle which may result in evolutionary constraints limiting diversification.
The following outline is an overview of and topical guide to botany, the biological academic discipline involving the study of plants.
Important structures in plant development are buds, shoots, roots, leaves, and flowers; plants produce these tissues and structures throughout their life from meristems located at the tips of organs, or between mature tissues. Thus, a living plant always has embryonic tissues. By contrast, an animal embryo will very early produce all of the body parts that it will ever have in its life. When the animal is born, it has all its body parts and from that point will only grow larger and more mature. However, both plants and animals pass through a phylotypic stage that evolved independently and that causes a developmental constraint limiting morphological diversification.
A stem is one of two main structural axes of a vascular plant, the other being the root. It supports leaves, flowers and fruits, transports water and dissolved substances between the roots and the shoots in the xylem and phloem, engages in photosynthesis, stores nutrients, and produces new living tissue. The stem can also be called the culm, halm, haulm, or thyrsus.
A leaf is a principal appendage of the stem of a vascular plant, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, stem, flower, and fruit collectively form the shoot system. In most leaves, the primary photosynthetic tissue is the palisade mesophyll and is located on the upper side of the blade or lamina of the leaf but in some species, including the mature foliage of Eucalyptus, palisade mesophyll is present on both sides and the leaves are said to be isobilateral. Most leaves are flattened and have distinct upper (adaxial) and lower (abaxial) surfaces that differ in color, hairiness, the number of stomata, the amount and structure of epicuticular wax and other features. Leaves are mostly green in color due to the presence of a compound called chlorophyll which is essential for photosynthesis as it absorbs light energy from the sun. A leaf with lighter-colored or white patches or edges is called a variegated leaf.
The history of botany examines the human effort to understand life on Earth by tracing the historical development of the discipline of botany—that part of natural science dealing with organisms traditionally treated as plants.
In plant morphology, thorns, spines, and prickles, and in general spinose structures, are hard, rigid extensions or modifications of leaves, roots, stems, or buds with sharp, stiff ends, and generally serve the same function: physically defending plants against herbivory.
A body is the physical material of an organism. It is only used for organisms which are in one part or whole. There are organisms which change from single cells to whole organisms: for example, slime molds. For them the term 'body' would mean the multicellular stage. Other uses:
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