Whittaker′s five–kingdom system

Whittaker distinguished three kingdoms of multicellular eukaryotes—

Plantae, Fungi, and Animalia—partly on the criterion of nutrition
 One current view of biological diversity
This tree summarizes the diversification of life over evolutionary time
 Plant Diversity I
• 1- Land plants evolved from green
algae
• 2- Land plants possess a set of derived
terrestrial adaptations
• 3- The life cycles of mosses and other
bryophytes are dominated by the
gametophyte stage
• 4- Ferns and other seedless vascular
plants formed the first forests
• Red algae and green algae are the
closest relatives of land plants
• - Land plants evolved from green algae
descended from the photosynthetic
descendants of an ancient
heterotrophic protest acquired a
cyanobacterial endosymbiont.
• - A look at the diversity of the green
plants’ closest algal relatives, red algae
and green algae.
• Red Algae (Rhodophytes)
• - Presence of accessory pigment called
phycoerythrin, which masks the green of
chlorophyll.
• - The thalli of many red algae are
filamentous, often branched
• - The base of the thallus is usually
differentiated as a simple holdfast.
• - Alternation of generations is common.
• - Unlike other algae, red algae have no
flagellated stages in their life cycle and
depend on water currents to bring gametes
together for fertilization.
• Green Algae
• - Molecular systematics and cellular
morphology leave little doubt that green
algae and land plants are closely related.
• In fact, some systematists now advocate the
inclusion of green algae in an expanded
“plant” kingdom, Viridiplantae.
• - Green algae are divided into two main
groups, chlorophytes and charophyceans.
• - The simplest chlorophytes are biflagellated
unicellular organisms such as
Chlamydomonas, which resemble the
gametes and zoospores of more complex
chlorophytes.
• - Larger size and greater complexity
evolved in chlorophytes by three different
mechanisms:
• (1) the formation of colonies of individual
cells, as seen in Volvox and in filamentous
forms that contribute to the stringy masses
known as pond scum;
• (2) the repeated division of nuclei with no
cytoplasmic division, as seen in the
multinucleate filaments of Caulerpa; and
• (3) the formation of true multicellular forms
by cell division and cell differentiation, as
in Ulva.
Ancient plant spores and tissue
Diversity of Gymnosperms
Diversity of Gymnosperms (Cont.)
From ovule to seed
The life cycle of a pine