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The basic function of the xylem is to transport water upward from the roots to parts of the plants such as stems and leaves, but it also transports nutrients. [1] [2] The word xylem is derived from the Ancient Greek word, ξύλον (xylon), meaning "wood"; the best-known xylem tissue is wood, though it is found throughout a plant. [3]
Between the xylem and phloem is a meristem called the vascular cambium. This tissue divides off cells that will become additional xylem and phloem. This growth increases the girth of the plant, rather than its length. As long as the vascular cambium continues to produce new cells, the plant will continue to grow more stout.
Xylem is the water-conducting tissue, and the secondary xylem provides the raw material for the forest products industry. [26] Xylem and phloem tissues each play a part in the conduction processes within plants. Sugars are conveyed throughout the plant in the phloem; water and other nutrients pass through the xylem.
The presence of vessels in xylem has been considered to be one of the key innovations that led to the success of the flowering plants. It was once thought that vessel elements were an evolutionary innovation of flowering plants, but their absence from some basal angiosperms and their presence in some members of the Gnetales suggest that this hypothesis must be re-examined; vessel elements in ...
Pyramids of energy are normally upright, but other pyramids can be inverted (pyramid of biomass for marine region) or take other shapes (spindle shaped pyramid). Ecological pyramids begin with producers on the bottom (such as plants) and proceed through the various trophic levels (such as herbivores that eat plants, then carnivores that eat ...
In woody plants, it forms a cylinder of unspecialized meristem cells, as a continuous ring from which the new tissues are grown. Unlike the xylem and phloem, it does not transport water, minerals or food through the plant. Other names for the vascular cambium are the main cambium, wood cambium, or bifacial cambium.
Non-vascular plants are often among the first species to move into new and inhospitable territories, along with prokaryotes and protists, and thus function as pioneer species. [ citation needed ] Mosses and leafy liverworts have structures called phyllids that resemble leaves , but only consist of single sheets of cells with no internal air ...
A pteridophyte is a vascular plant (with xylem and phloem) that reproduces by means of spores. Because pteridophytes produce neither flowers nor seeds, they are sometimes referred to as "cryptogams", meaning that their means of reproduction is hidden. They are also the ancestors of the plants we see today.