Plant diversity and evolution of plant kingdom

Plant are the multicellular and mostly photosynthesis organism which found essentially
everywhere both in water and on the land
Aquatic plant:
It includes:

 Red algae
 Green algae
 Brown algae
Land plant:
It includes:

 Mosses
 Ferns
 Gymnosperms and angiosperms
The gymnosperms or flowering plants are dominated the earth the last 70 million years. There
are over 30,000 angiosperms species growing on the earth which Sows the enormous diversity
in size and form. The earliest plant were algae living in the ocean more than 700 million years
ago. Modern plant evolved from aquatic algae that did not have stem and roots. Compared to
the life of ocean the terrestrial environment provided free access to the sunlight and freedom
from damage by large organism that called crush or eat developing plant. However, the
conditions on land is not hospitable for early plants.
Challenges for early plants:
The challenges of the plants were the migration to the land where water lacking is the major
problems because in aquatic environment desiccations of the water is the problems. Early plant
has the no protective layer to prevent water lose. So, they Dried out quickly. So, the plant
requires changes in structural features that protect and support these conditions.
Diversity of plants on basis of Habitat :
On the basis of Habitat plant can classified in following groups:
1. Hydrophytes
2. Hygrophytes
3. Halophytes
4. Mesophytes
5. Xerophytes.
1. Hydrophytes:
Hydro means water and phyte mean plants. The plant growing near the water and
submerged under the water called hydrophytes. Such plant has poor root system soft
stamp and poor vascular tissue. The bulk of tissue is provided with air spaces
These plants may be:
Submerged
 Vasllisneria
 Hydrilla
 Potamogeton
Free floating and fixed floating

 Lemna
 Pistia
 Trapa etc
Two angiosperms are also marine:

 Zostera
 Thalasia

2. Hygrophytes:
The plants that grow in moist and shaddy habitat called hygrophytes. Their stem and
roots are soft and shows stunned growth. Their leaves are developed and provided with
the stomata.
Examples:
 Ferns
 Begonias

3. Halophytes:
The plants that grow in the saline soil or the saline water called halophytes. They can
tolerate high concentration of salt.

Examples of Salts:
 NaCl
 MgCl2 etc

Examples:
 Rhizophora
 Sonneratia
 4. Mesophytes:
The plants that live moderate and water supply areas are called mesophytes.
 They are fast growing and large.
 They have well developed roots and leave
The stem may be:
Woody and herbaceous.
There are certain mesophytes such as, Deciduous tree(shedding their leaves at the
certain season (which are mesophytes during summer and xerophytes during winter.)

5. Xerophytes:
The plants that grow in dry conditions where the limited water supply called xerophytes.
Examples:
 Euphorbia
 Ziziphus.

Some store water in their stem, leaves and roots called succulent. Xerophytes are
classified into the following types:
 Lithophytes (plant growing on root)
 Psamophytes(plant growing in sandy soil )
 Oxylophytes (plants growing acidic soil)

6. Epiphytes:
The plant that grow on the trunk or branches of other plant called epiphytes.
Examples:
Orchid and lichens growing as an epiphyte on mango branches. They are considered as
space parasite. The interaction between the orchid and growing on tree is example of
commensilism.
7. Parasitic plants:
The plants that lived on the other plants as parasite called parasitic plants
Examples
 Cuscuta
 Striga (grown on roots of jawar)

Diversity of plants on basis of Habitat (size, shape and forms ) angiosperms

classified into :
1-Herbs
(Herbaceous)
The stem of those plants: green delicate and short. Usually their life is short e.g (wheat ,grams).
In some herbaceous plants underground part of the stem is greatly reduced while aerial branch
with flowers at the tip arise from the underground part at the time of reproduction. Such stem
called scape. e.g ( onion)
2 – Shrubs
(Shrubby and fructicose)
These plant are woody branches and larger than herbs. Usually with several stems but no main
axises
Examples:

 China rose
 Henna
 Rose
3-Tree
(Arborescent)
These plants are larger and larger than Shrubs, hard woody very developed and thick possesses
a prominent trunk. These are following types:

 Caudex
The stem is branched and usually bears a crown of leaves at the apex
Examples:
Date palm
 Excurrent
The lower part of the stem is thicker which gradually taper above these plants appears as
conical due to the acropetal arrangements of branches on main stem
 Deliquescent
The apical bud of main stem dies after some time. While branches and subbranches spread
in different directions
Example:
Ferns
4-Culms
The nodes and antinodes are extremely prominent called culms. Internodes of these plants are
hallow usually these plants are grasses but can’t be considered as Herbs , Shrubs and tree
Example: bamboo

Diversity of angiosperms on basis of nature of stem

On basis of nature of stem they classified as fallow

 Erect
 Creepers
 Trailer
 Climbers

a. Erect
The plants that grow upright called Erect. Most tree shrubs and some herbs have strong
stem that can stand Erect on soil
b. Creepers
This plant has trailing stamp having root throughout its length. These have weak long and
thick stem that creep on surface of soil. Leaves emerged from nodes from axial which
branches arise adventitious roots arise from nodes throughout length of stem
c. Trailers
The plants having trailer is rooted in soil at one point only
 It creep along surface of soil without attaching
 It doesn’t an ordinary stem branch
 It doesn’t bear scales leaves
 It doesn’t part in reproduction vegetative reproduction.
d. Climber
The plants with weak stem climb on some support by means of tendril, Spines Adventitious
root etc
Example: pea

Diversity on basis of life span

On basis of life span the angiosperms classified following as:
1. Ephemerals
Such plants Such plant complete their life span with in a very short period before the
approach of actual dry condition. These are not true xerophytes often called as drought
evaders or drought escaper
Examples:
 Cassia tora
 Arternesia
2. Annuals
They complete their life cycle within one year and die after producing seeds
Examples:
 Wheat
 Gram
 Rice

3. Biennials
The plants complete their life within two years during first year they show the vegetative
growth and during second year they developed:
 Fruits
 Flowers
 Seeds
They are usually herbing e.g. Carrot, Radish
4. Perennials
These have long life and once established it continues etc survive for many year
Examples
Bodhi tree at gaya is about 2500-year-old. Most Perennials after attaining maturity bear flowers
and fruit in particular season of each year called polycarpic such as.
 Mango
 Coconut
Some are monocarpic bear fruit only once in their life. All Annuals and Biennials are monocarpic

Diversity on basis of size

The angiosperms plants show the great variation in sizes;

 Smallest angiosperms are rootless aquatic wolffia (Diameter 0.1mm)

 Aquatic lemna (Diameter 0.1cm)
 Tallest angiosperms plant: Eucalyptus (it is 100 m tall while some are 130 m)
 The largest size of plants: banyan tree ( spread over 2-5 acres area )

Diversity on basis of nutrition

They classified as
1. Autotrophic plant
2. Heterotrophic plant
Autotrophic plant
They are green and manufacture their own organic food from inorganic material such as carbon
monoxide and water
Heterotopic plant
These obtained their food from outside sources they maybe

 Saprophytes
 Symbiont
 Insectivorous
 Parasites

Evaluation of Plant
Evaluation of land plants from the Ordovician period through Middle Ordovician Period.
Botanist now believe that plants evolved from algae the development of plants kingdom may
related from evolutionary that occur when photosynthetic multicellular organism involved as
continent
Plant evolution on land has continued throughout as geological eras of time
1. Precambrian era
2. Paleozoic era
3. Mesozoic era
4. Cenozoic era

1. Pre Cambrian era

(4000-541 million years ago)
Plants first appeared on the land approximately 700millions years ago. This time land was
completely compromised of barren rock with spare occurrence of

 Algae
 Bacteria
 Fungi
When they have adopted on the land

 Increased oxygen percentage

 Decrease carbon dioxide percentage in the earth’s atmosphere
 This shift to facilitate new life and evolution

2. Paleozoic era

1) Cambrian period (541-485 million year ago)

2) Ordovician period (485-443 million year ago)
3) Silurian period (443-419 million year ago)
4) Devonian period (419-358 million year ago)
5) Carboniferous period (358-298 million year ago)
6) Permian period (299-251 million year ago)

1) Cambrian era (541-485 million year ago)

Due to the extremely high percentage of carbon dioxide, earth atmosphere
temperatures would have been approximately 120 degree during this period
 Most of the plant life consist of the small, soft and marine plants such as green algae
  The terrestrial plant evolved they cool the climate and provided oxygen to pave the
path of life to adapt on land
 This led to the Cambrian explosion a period in which consist of ancestor of modern-
day plants and animals evolved

2) Ordovician period (485-443 million years ago)

Because of the earliest land plant were non vascular ,they did not have to conduct
water. Therefore the terrestrial plant of the these period lived primarily in the
environment. These early plants reproduce by spores

3) Silurian period (443-419 million years ago)

The first vascular plant evolved in this period. Most of the plant of this period shows no
differentiation of the leaves, stem and roots. This adaptation of the land plants to stand
upright and draw water upward through their structure such as
 Lignin
 Complex organic polymers
These are the crucial for the adaptation. Scientist discovered the presence of the lignin
in the marine red algae suggested that even the earliest plant have the potential to
adaptation to stand upright and conduct water.
4) Devonian period (419-358 million year ago
The first recognizing soil developed in this period.
Plant developed
 Sexual organ for the reproduction
 Stem with vascular tissue
 Woody tissue for structure
 Stomata for the reproduction
Ecosystem dominated by plants due to the largest areas of the trees. Earth climate
cooled down due the forest so carbon dioxide level decreased as the oxygen level
increased due the proliferation of the plants
5) carboniferous period (358-298 million year ago)
Plant continue to develop different structure. Seed palm developed and colonized
habitat. These were gymnosperm plants that produce seeds located on the leaves or
scales of cones gymnosperm such as conifers tree and ferns appeared in this period.

6) Permian period (299-251 million year ago )

The climate are dry and leads of evolution of conifers of cycades and ginkgo appeared.
Widespread forestation appeared in some region
3. Mesozoic era
Triassic period (251-201 million year ago)
Seed bearing plants dominated over all other gymnosperm such as
1)Conifers 2) Ginkgo
Were most prevalent plants of this period
Jurassic period (201-145 million years ago)
The climate became welter and developing of the large forest where the conifers plants are
dominated the landscape. Flowering plants are appeared in this period and play a minor
role among the plants
Cretaceous period (145-66 million year ago)
Angiosperms are the plant in which both male and female reproductive organ are housed in
a flower and dominated into the plants. Modern day tree appeared. Conifers are the
important tree in the colder areas. Ancestor of modern ferns are evolved during the late
cretaceous period
4. Cenozoic period
 Tertiary period (66-1.8 million year ago)
 Quaternary period (1.8 million years ago)
Tertiary period (66-1.8 million years ago)
Grasses evolved during this period leads to the development of the savanna ecosystem.
Proliferation of the grasses provided food for the large, grazing mammals and the
protection for the small animals such as rodents.
Conifers dominate in colder climate while angiosperm (flowering and frits plants) were
dominant in tropical climate
Quaternary period (1.8 million years ago)
When the climate cooled down the large forest died off, leading to the dry condition.
This happen around 30 million year ago, grasses flourished due their ability to adopt of
dry condition.
Human first appeared during this period. After living for thousands of the years as
Human gathers. Human began to cultivate the plants as the source of food. Starting
about 13,000 year ago earliest agriculture consisted of cultivating grasses such as
 Wheat
 Barley
 Later ancient humans cultivate corns, beans now grain such as

 Rice
 Millet

Plant kingdom
Classification of the plant kingdom as a fellow

 Plant body
 Vascular system
 Seed formation

1. Plant body
Presence or absence of a well differentiated plant body such as

 Root
 Stem
 Leaves

2. Vascular system
Presence or absence of this system for the transport of water and other substances
Examples

 Phloem
 Xylem

3. Seed formation
Presence or absence of flowers and seeds of the naked enclosed in a fruit

The plant kingdom is subdivided in to 5 groups

1) Thallus
2) Bryophyta
3) Pteridophytes
4) Gymnosperm
5) Angiosperm
Thallus:
Thallophytes lack the body differentiated body structure and the plant body is thallus like It
include the plants with the primitive and simple body structure.
The plant body is thallus they may be
  Filamentous
 Colonial
 Branched
 Unbranched
Examples:

 Green algae
 Brown algae
 Red algae
Common examples:

 Volvox
 Chara
 Spirogyra
Bryophytes:

 It does not have any vascular tissue

 The plant body have root like structure
 The plant body have stem like structure
 The plant body have leaf like structure
 These are terrestrial plant but called amphibian of plant kingdom because they need
water for their sexual reproduction
 These plants present in the moist and shady areas
It included:

 Mosses
 Hornworts
 Liverworts
Common examples:

 Funaria
 Marchantia
Pteridophyte

 They have a well differentiated plant into roots ,stem and leaves
 They have vascular system for conduction of water and other substances
Common examples are:

 Seleginella
 Pteris etc.
Gymnosperm:

 They have well differentiated plant body and vascular tissue

 They bear naked seeds such as :seeds are not enclosed within the fruits
Common examples are :

 Cycas
 Pinus
 Ephedra etc.
Angiosperm

 They have seed bearing vascular plants with the well differentiated plants body
 Their seeds are enclosed within the fruits
 They are widely distributed and vary in their size
o Wolffia =small tree 0.1cm
o Eucalyptus =tall tree 100m

They are further divided into:

 Monocotyledons
 Dicotyledons
According to the cotyledons present in the seeds
Examples:
o Mango
o Rose
o Tomato
o Onion etc.