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Plant Evolutionary Developmental Biology
Evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) is the study of developmental programs and patterns from an evolutionary perspective. It seeks to understand the various influences shaping the form and nature of life on the planet. Evo-devo arose as a separate branch of science rather recently. An early sign of this occurred in 1999. Most of the synthesis in evo-devo has been in the field of animal evolution, one reason being the presence of model systems like ''Drosophila melanogaster'', ''C. elegans'', zebrafish and ''Xenopus laevis''. However, since 1980, a wealth of information on plant morphology, coupled with modern molecular techniques has helped shed light on the conserved and unique developmental patterns in the plant kingdom also. Historical perspective Before 1900 The origin of the term " morphology" is generally attributed to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832). He was of the opinion that there is an underlying fundamental organisation (') in the diversity of flo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Evolutionary Developmental Biology
Evolutionary developmental biology (informally, evo-devo) is a field of biological research that compares the developmental processes of different organisms to infer how developmental processes evolved. The field grew from 19th-century beginnings, where embryology faced a mystery: zoologists did not know how embryonic development was controlled at the molecular level. Charles Darwin noted that having similar embryos implied common ancestry, but little progress was made until the 1970s. Then, recombinant DNA technology at last brought embryology together with molecular genetics. A key early discovery was of homeotic genes that regulate development in a wide range of eukaryotes. The field is composed of multiple core evolutionary concepts. One is deep homology, the finding that dissimilar organs such as the eyes of insects, vertebrates and cephalopod molluscs, long thought to have evolved separately, are controlled by similar genes such as ''pax-6'', from the evo-devo gene ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marcello Malpighi
Marcello Malpighi (10 March 1628 – 30 November 1694) was an Italian biologist and physician, who is referred to as the "Founder of microscopical anatomy, histology & Father of physiology and embryology". Malpighi's name is borne by several physiological features related to the biological excretory system, such as the Malpighian corpuscles and Malpighian pyramids of the kidneys and the Malpighian tubule system of insects. The splenic lymphoid nodules are often called the "Malpighian bodies of the spleen" or Malpighian corpuscles. The botanical family Malpighiaceae is also named after him. He was the first person to see capillaries in animals, and he discovered the link between arteries and veins that had eluded William Harvey. Malpighi was one of the earliest people to observe red blood cells under a microscope, after Jan Swammerdam. His treatise ''De polypo cordis'' (1666) was important for understanding blood composition, as well as how blood clots. In it, Malpighi descr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Population
Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using a census, a process of collecting, analysing, compiling, and publishing data regarding a population. Perspectives of various disciplines Social sciences In sociology and population geography, population refers to a group of human beings with some predefined criterion in common, such as location, race, ethnicity, nationality, or religion. Demography is a social science which entails the statistical study of populations. Ecology In ecology, a population is a group of organisms of the same species who inhabit the same particular geographical area and are capable of interbreeding. The area of a sexual population is the area where inter-breeding is possible between any pair within the area and more probable than cro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plant Anatomy
Plant anatomy or phytotomy is the general term for the study of the internal structure of plants. Originally it included plant morphology, the description of the physical form and external structure of plants, but since the mid-20th century plant anatomy has been considered a separate field referring only to internal plant structure. Plant anatomy is now frequently investigated at the cellular level, and often involves the sectioning of tissues and microscopy. Structural divisions Some studies of plant anatomy use a systems approach, organized on the basis of the plant's activities, such as nutrient transport, flowering, pollination, embryogenesis or seed development. Others are more classically divided into the following structural categories: : Flower anatomy, including study of the Calyx, Corolla, Androecium, and Gynoecium : Leaf anatomy, including study of the Epidermis, stomata and Palisade cells : Stem anatomy, including Stem structure and vascular tissues, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arabidopsis Thaliana
''Arabidopsis thaliana'', the thale cress, mouse-ear cress or arabidopsis, is a small flowering plant native to Eurasia and Africa. ''A. thaliana'' is considered a weed; it is found along the shoulders of roads and in disturbed land. A winter annual with a relatively short lifecycle, ''A. thaliana'' is a popular model organism in plant biology and genetics. For a complex multicellular eukaryote, ''A. thaliana'' has a relatively small genome around 135 megabase pairs. It was the first plant to have its genome sequenced, and is a popular tool for understanding the molecular biology of many plant traits, including flower development and light sensing. Description ''Arabidopsis thaliana'' is an annual (rarely biennial) plant, usually growing to 20–25 cm tall. The leaves form a rosette at the base of the plant, with a few leaves also on the flowering stem. The basal leaves are green to slightly purplish in color, 1.5–5 cm long, and 2–10 mm broad, with ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alternation Of Generations
Alternation of generations (also known as metagenesis or heterogenesis) is the predominant type of life cycle in plants and algae. It consists of a multicellular haploid sexual phase, the gametophyte, which has a single set of chromosomes alternating with a multicellular diploid asexual phase, the sporophyte which has two sets of chromosomes. A mature sporophyte produces haploid spores by meiosis, a process which reduces the number of chromosomes to half, from two sets to one. The resulting haploid spores germinate and grow into multicellular haploid gametophytes. At maturity, a gametophyte produces gametes by mitosis, the normal process of cell division in eukaryotes, which maintains the original number of chromosomes. Two haploid gametes (originating from different organisms of the same species or from the same organism) fuse to produce a diploid zygote, which divides repeatedly by mitosis, developing into a multicellular diploid sporophyte. This cycle, from gametophyte t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Geotaxis
Gravitaxis (or ''geotaxis'') is a form of taxis characterized by the directional movement of an organism in response to gravity. Gravitaxis is one of the many forms of taxis. It is characterized by the movement of an organism in response to gravitational forces. It is sometimes called geotaxis. There are a few different causes for gravitaxis. Many microorganisms have receptors like statocysts that allow them to sense the direction of gravity and to adjust their orientation accordingly. However, gravitaxis can result also from a purely physical mechanism so that organs for sensing the direction of gravity are not necessary. An example is given by microorganisms with a center of mass that is shifted to one end of the organism. Similar to a buoy, such mass-anisotropic microorganisms orient upwards under gravity. It has been shown that even an asymmetry in the shape of microorganisms can be sufficient to cause gravitaxis. Gravitaxis is different from gravitropism in a way that the latt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phototaxis
Phototaxis is a kind of taxis, or locomotory movement, that occurs when a whole organism moves towards or away from a stimulus of light. This is advantageous for phototrophic organisms as they can orient themselves most efficiently to receive light for photosynthesis. Phototaxis is called positive if the movement is in the direction of increasing light intensity and negative if the direction is opposite. Two types of positive phototaxis are observed in prokaryotes. The first is called scotophobotaxis (from the word "scotophobia"), which is observed only under a microscope. This occurs when a bacterium swims by chance out of the area illuminated by the microscope. Entering darkness signals the cell to reverse flagella rotation direction and reenter the light. The second type of phototaxis is true phototaxis, which is a directed movement up a gradient to an increasing amount of light. This is analogous to positive chemotaxis except that the attractant is light rather than a chem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Interdisciplinary
Interdisciplinarity or interdisciplinary studies involves the combination of multiple academic disciplines into one activity (e.g., a research project). It draws knowledge from several other fields like sociology, anthropology, psychology, economics, etc. It is about creating something by thinking across boundaries. It is related to an ''interdiscipline'' or an ''interdisciplinary field,'' which is an organizational unit that crosses traditional boundaries between academic disciplines or schools of thought, as new needs and professions emerge. Large engineering teams are usually interdisciplinary, as a power station or mobile phone or other project requires the melding of several specialties. However, the term "interdisciplinary" is sometimes confined to academic settings. The term ''interdisciplinary'' is applied within education and training pedagogies to describe studies that use methods and insights of several established disciplines or traditional fields of study. Inte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wilhelm Hofmeister
Wilhelm Friedrich Benedikt Hofmeister (18 May 1824 – 12 January 1877) was a German biologist and botanist. He "stands as one of the true giants in the history of biology and belongs in the same pantheon as Darwin and Mendel." He was largely self-taught. Biography Hofmeister and his sister Clementine were the children of Friederich and Frederike (nee Seidenschnur) Hofmeister. His father was a book and music publisher and seller in Leipzig. He left vocational high school (''Realschule'') at the age of 15 and was apprenticed in a bookshop in Hamburg by an acquaintance of his father. He met Muriel Agnes Lurgenstein and they married in 1847, subsequently having nine children. That same year, he was initiated freemasonry at Lodge Apollo in Hamburg. She (died 28 March 1870) and seven children pre-deceased him. His second marriage to Johanna Schmidt on 26 February 1876 was short because he died in 1877 following several strokes. He did most of his research in his free-time, l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Darwinism
Darwinism is a theory of biological evolution developed by the English naturalist Charles Darwin (1809–1882) and others, stating that all species of organisms arise and develop through the natural selection of small, inherited variations that increase the individual's ability to compete, survive, and reproduce. Also called Darwinian theory, it originally included the broad concepts of transmutation of species or of evolution which gained general scientific acceptance after Darwin published ''On the Origin of Species'' in 1859, including concepts which predated Darwin's theories. English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley coined the term ''Darwinism'' in April 1860. Terminology Darwinism subsequently referred to the specific concepts of natural selection, the Weismann barrier, or the central dogma of molecular biology. Though the term usually refers strictly to biological evolution, creationists have appropriated it to refer to the origin of life or to cosmic evolution, that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carl Linnaeus
Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming organisms. He is known as the "father of modern taxonomy". Many of his writings were in Latin; his name is rendered in Latin as and, after his 1761 ennoblement, as . Linnaeus was born in Råshult, the countryside of Småland, in southern Sweden. He received most of his higher education at Uppsala University and began giving lectures in botany there in 1730. He lived abroad between 1735 and 1738, where he studied and also published the first edition of his ' in the Netherlands. He then returned to Sweden where he became professor of medicine and botany at Uppsala. In the 1740s, he was sent on several journeys through Sweden to find and classify plants and animals. In the 1750s and 1760s, he continued to co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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