Lauren Boyles

Biol 112 502

Assignment #3

Vascular Seed Plants

The characters on the cladogram include Green algae, mosses, ferns, conifers, and
angiosperms. Each of these organisms, in their own, contributed to the evolution and creation of
life. Billions of years ago, the earth was barren; there was no vitality, no color. It was a gaseous
wasteland, covered with volcanoes burping hot ash into the atmosphere. As time progressed,
thankfully, so did life.
The progression of growth of algae (and cyanobacteria) led to an eventual oxygenation of
the atmosphere. As the amount of oxygen increased, the temperature began to fall. The
atmosphere gradually stabled, all due to a tiny plant. The first land plants were non vascular
plants; these included bryophytes (mosses), hepatophytes (liverworts), and anthoceraphytes
(hornworts). Mosses need to live in moist areas so that the water can carry their reproductive
cells to each other, and the plants may continue to reproduce. These plants are what made it
possible for other organisms to colonize on land. As plants evolved, they gained height and
vascular tissue.
Pterophyta, Ferns, are one of those plants. Ferns have gametophytes and sporophytes
separate from one another, however, male and female features are both present on the
gametophyte. Ferns have sporangia in clusters (called a sorus) under the leaves of the fern, and
the spores that emerge from them are carried away. The height of plants only rose higher and
higher; the following character on the cladogram are gymnosperms.
Gymnosperms include cycads, ginkgophyta, and confierophyta. These grow as trees; each
of these have even more advanced ways of spreading their reproductive cells. In confiers, male
and female cones are both present in the tree, same as the gametophytes of ferns. In the
ovuliferous scales of the female cone, the megasporangium is held; in the male cone with
microsporophylls, microsporangium reside in the microsporohylls. Gymnosperms have, what are
called, naked seeds, meaning the seeds are not enclosed by fruit or ovaries. This means, they
do not bear fruit, however, gymnosperms provide shelter for many organisms, as well as
providing lumber for construction and sale, resin, and turpentine.

Lauren Boyles
Biol 112 502
Assignment #3

Fruit would be the final adaptation in land plants on the cladogram; it provides a wider
seed dispersal, and protection for the seed. Fruits are eaten, their seeds digested by animals and
then deposited in another places through fecal matter. Others are transported by the weather,
wind or water. Not only are fruits unique to angiosperms, but flowers are as well. The flower is a
specialized shoot that helps attract carriers to carry on pollination, which leads to double
fertilization (another unique trait to angiosperms). Once fertilization has occurred, a polyploid
endosperm develops. This is the fruit. The fruits, of course, provide food and nourishment to
animals and humans. Theyre a huge part of the economy as well, fruits are a big part of the
production business; both as the base for many independent farms and as a small section of a larg
grocery chain.