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A leaf (pl.: leaves) is a principal appendage of the stem of a vascular plant, [1] usually borne laterally above ground and specialized for photosynthesis.Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", [2] [3] while the leaves, stem, flower, and fruit collectively form the shoot system. [4]
The epidermis is the outermost cell layer of the primary plant body. In some older works the cells of the leaf epidermis have been regarded as specialized parenchyma cells, [1] but the established modern preference has long been to classify the epidermis as dermal tissue, [2] whereas parenchyma is classified as ground tissue. [3]
The primary function of the translucent windows is to increase the absorption of radiant energy, and thereby the rate of photosynthesis. [5] Epidermal windows are commonly situated at the apex of leaves, allowing light to be captured and utilized even when the plant is almost entirely below the soil surface, [6] minimizing exposure of leaf surface area to desiccation by intense heat.
Palisade cells contain a high concentration of chloroplasts, particularly in the upper portion of the cell, making them the primary site of photosynthesis in the leaves of plants that contain them. Their vacuole also aids in this function: it is large and central, pushing the chloroplasts to the edge of the cell, maximising the absorption of ...
Botany is a natural science concerned with the study of plants.The main branches of botany (also referred to as "plant science") are commonly divided into three groups: core topics, concerned with the study of the fundamental natural phenomena and processes of plant life, the classification and description of plant diversity; applied topics which study the ways in which plants may be used for ...
In plant morphology, a cataphyll (sometimes also called a cataphyllum [1] or cataphyll leaf [2]) is a reduced, small leaf. [3] Many plants have both "true leaves" (euphylls), which perform most of the photosynthesis, and cataphylls, which are modified to perform other functions. [4]
Plants with microphyll leaves occur early in the fossil record, and few such plants exist today. In the classical concept of a microphyll, the leaf vein emerges from the protostele without leaving a leaf gap. Leaf gaps are small areas above the node of some leaves where there is no vascular tissue, as it has all been diverted to the leaf.
Palmately compound leaf of hemp. A leaflet (occasionally called foliole) in botany is a leaf-like part of a compound leaf. [1] Though it resembles an entire leaf, a leaflet is not borne on a main plant stem or branch, as a leaf is, but rather on a petiole or a branch of the leaf. [2]