mORE ON KINGDOM PLANTAE
Kingdom Plantae is one of the major groups of organism that comprises about 266,000 known species of ferns, mosses, herbaceous and woody plants, liverworts, vines, bushes, trees and other forms of plants that dominate the earth
CHARACTERISTICS AT THE CELLULAR LEVEL
Plants are Eukaryotic, they have cell walls and chloroplasts, they have an absence of locomotion organs, and their cells have cellulose walls that uphold their size.
IMPORTANCE OF PLANTS
Kingdom Plantae has been producing and sustaining life on earth since the beginning of life forms. They manufacture food for other organisms and provide energy to sustain life. Plants play a vital role in the maintenance of life on Earth.
OBTAINING NUTRIENTS
Plants are autotrophs; organisms that synthesize all their own organic nutrients and do not rely on other organisms for food. They obtain nutrients through a process called photosynthesis. In the process of photosynthesis, plants convert water, carbon dioxide, and light energy into oxygen, sugars, and more water. They store their food in the form of starch.
OTHER CHARACTERISTICS
They generally possess pigments (chlorophylls a and b and carotenoids), which play a central role in converting the energy of sunlight, into chemical energy by means of photosynthesis. The life histories of plants include two phases, or generations, one of which is diploid (the nuclei of the cells contain two sets of chromosomes), the other is haploid (with one set of chromosomes). Primary producers, represented by trees, shrubs, and herbs, are a prolific source of energy in the form of carbohydrates (sugars) stored in the leaves. These carbohydrates, produced in photosynthesis, are broken down in a process called respiration; the smaller units of the sugar molecule and its products fuel numerous metabolic processes.
STRUCTURE
The most basic shared feature of most plants is their division into shoots and roots. The root, defined as the portion of a plant beneath the soil, brings in essential water and minerals from the soil. The shoot includes all aerial plant structures such as stems, leaves, flowers, and fruits. Each of these parts, the root and the shoot, is dependent on the other, for roots cannot perform photosynthesis and shoots cannot take in water and inorganic nutrients.
GROUPS
Plants are divided into the four main groups. These classifications was based on: the presence of vascular tissue, the absence of vascular tissue, the presence of seeds, and the absence of seeds