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Aquatic plants require special adaptations for prolonged inundation in water, and for floating at the water surface. The most common adaptation is the presence of lightweight internal packing cells, aerenchyma , but floating leaves and finely dissected leaves are also common.
Secondary aquatic adaptations tend to develop in early speciation as the animal ventures into water in order to find available food. As successive generations spend more time in the water, natural selection causes the acquisition of more adaptations. Animals of later generations may spend most their life in the water, coming ashore for mating.
Aquatic environments have relatively low oxygen levels, forcing adaptation by the organisms found there. For example, many wetland plants must produce aerenchyma to carry oxygen to roots. Other biotic characteristics are more subtle and difficult to measure, such as the relative importance of competition, mutualism or predation. [ 20 ]
Aerenchyma in stem cross section of a typical wetland plant. Aerenchyma or aeriferous parenchyma [1] or lacunae, is a modification of the parenchyma to form a spongy tissue that creates spaces or air channels in the leaves, stems and roots of some plants, which allows exchange of gases between the shoot and the root. [2]
Nelumbo nucifera, an aquatic plant. Algae, including both phytoplankton and periphyton, are the principle photosynthesizers in ponds and lakes. [8] Phytoplankton are found drifting in the water column of the pelagic zone. Many species have a higher density than water, which should cause them to sink inadvertently down into the benthos.
Xerophytic plants exhibit a diversity of specialized adaptations to survive in such water-limiting conditions. They may use water from their own storage, allocate water specifically to sites of new tissue growth, or lose less water to the atmosphere and so channel a greater proportion of water from the soil to photosynthesis and growth.
Mangrove roots above and below water. Mangrove plants require a number of physiological adaptations to overcome the problems of low environmental oxygen levels, high salinity, and frequent tidal flooding. Each species has its own solutions to these problems; this may be the primary reason why, on some shorelines, mangrove tree species show ...
Aquatic CAM plants capture carbon at night when it is abundant due to a lack of competition from other photosynthetic organisms. [16] This also results in lowered photorespiration due to less photosynthetically generated oxygen. Aquatic CAM is most marked in the summer months when there is increased competition for CO 2, compared to the winter ...
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