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Can you explain the reproduction in plants? |
Fertilization in flowering plants is unique among all known organisms, in that not one but two cells are fertilized, in a process called double fertilization. One sperm nucleus in the pollen tube fuses with the egg cell in the embryo sac, and the other sperm nucleus fuses with the diploid endosperm nucleus. The fertilized egg cell is a zygote that develops into the diploid embryo of the sporophyte. The fertilized endosperm nucleus develops into the triploid endosperm, a nutritive tissue that sustains the embryo and seedling. The only other known plant group exhibiting double fertilization is the Gnetales in the genus Ephedra, a nonflowering seed plant. However, in this case the second fertilization product degenerates and does not develop into endosperm. Double fertilization begins when the pollen tube grows into one of the two synergid cells in the embryo sac, possibly as a result of chemical attraction to calcium. After penetrating the synergid, the apex of the pollen tube breaks open, releasing the two sperm nuclei and other contents into the synergid. As the synergid degenerates, it envelops the egg and endosperm cells, holding the two sperm nuclei close and the other expelled contents of the pollen tube. The egg cell then opens and engulfs the sperm cell, whose membrane breaks apart and allows the nucleus to move near the egg nucleus. The nuclear envelopes then disintegrate, and the two nuclei combine to form the single diploid nucleus of the zygote. The other sperm cell fuses with the two endosperm nuclei, forming a single triploid cell, the primary endosperm cell, which divides mitotically into the endosperm tissue. Most flowering plant species reproduce primarily by outcrossing, including the great majority of trees, shrubs, and perennial herbs. Adaptations that prevent self-fertilization include self-incompatibility (genetic recognition and blocking of self-pollen) and dioecy (separate male and female individuals). Adaptations that reduce the chances of self-pollination in hermaphrodites include separation of the anthers and stigma in space (herkogamy) or time (dichogamy). In many species, both self-incompatibility and spatiotemporal separation of the sex organs occur. The ability to produce new individuals asexually is common in plants. Under appropriate experimental conditions, nearly every cell of a flowering plant is capable of regenerating the entire plant. In nature, new plants may be regenerated from leaves, stems, or roots that receive an appropriate stimulus and become separated from the parent plant. In most cases, these new plants arise from undifferentiated parenchyma cells, which develop into buds that produce roots and shoots before or after separating from the parent. New plants can be produced from aboveground or belowground horizontal runners (stolons of strawberries, rhizomes of many grasses), tubers (potato, Jerusalem artichoke, dahlia), bulbs (onion, garlic), corms (crocus, gladiola), bulbils on the shoot (lily, many grasses), parenchyma cells in the leaves (Kalanchoe, African violet, jade plant) and inflorescence (arrowhead). Vegetative propagation is an economically important means of replicating valuable agricultural plants, through cuttings, layering, and grafting . Vegetative reproduction is especially common in aquatic vascular plants (for example, surfgrass and eelgrass), from which fragments can break off, disperse in the current, and develop into new whole plants. |