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The female gametophyte in gymnosperms differs from the male gametophyte as it spends its whole life cycle in one organ, the ovule located inside the megastrobilus or female cone. [14] Similar to the male gametophyte, the female gametophyte normally is fully dependent on the surrounding sporophytic tissue for nutrients and the two organisms ...
The sporophyte of a flowering plant is often described using sexual terms (e.g. "female" or "male") based on the sexuality of the gametophyte it gives rise to. For example, a sporophyte that produces spores that give rise only to male gametophytes may be described as "male", even though the sporophyte itself is asexual, producing only spores.
It is dioicous: male plants produce only antheridia in terminal rosettes, female plants produce only archegonia in the form of stalked capsules. [26] Seed plant gametophytes are also dioicous. However, the parent sporophyte may be monoecious, producing both male and female gametophytes or dioecious, producing gametophytes of one gender only.
Many algae and some fungi, for example ascomycetes and water moulds, also have antheridia during their reproductive stages. In gymnosperms and angiosperms, the male gametophytes have been reduced to pollen grains and in most of these the antheridia have been reduced to a single generative cell within the pollen grain.
Cycads and Ginkgo biloba are the only gymnosperms with motile sperm. [17] In the flowering plants , the female gametophyte is produced inside the ovule within the ovary of the flower. When mature, the haploid gametophyte produces female gametes which are ready for fertilization.
In ferns, gymnosperms, and flowering plants (angiosperms), the gametophytes are relatively small and the sporophyte is much larger. In gymnosperms and flowering plants the megagametophyte is contained within the ovule (that may develop into a seed) and the microgametophyte is contained within a pollen grain.
Early land plants had sporophytes that produced identical spores (isosporous or homosporous) but the ancestors of the gymnosperms evolved complex heterosporous life cycles in which the spores producing male and female gametophytes were of different sizes, the female megaspores tending to be larger, and fewer in number, than the male microspores ...
Location of ovules inside a Helleborus foetidus flower. In seed plants, the ovule is the structure that gives rise to and contains the female reproductive cells. It consists of three parts: the integument, forming its outer layer, the nucellus (or remnant of the megasporangium), and the female gametophyte (formed from a haploid megaspore) in its center.