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Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (/ ˌ æ n dʒ i ə ˈ s p ər m iː /). [5] [6] The term 'angiosperm' is derived from the Greek words ἀγγεῖον / angeion ('container, vessel') and σπέρμα / sperma ('seed'), meaning that the seeds are enclosed within a fruit.
The fossil history of flowering plants records the development of flowers and other distinctive structures of the angiosperms, now the dominant group of plants on land.The history is controversial as flowering plants appear in great diversity in the Cretaceous, with scanty and debatable records before that, creating a puzzle for evolutionary biologists that Charles Darwin named an "abominable ...
Flower of Liriodendron tulipifera, a Mesangiosperm. Mesangiospermae is a clade that contains the majority of flowering plants (angiosperms). Mesangiosperms are therefore known as the core angiosperms, in contrast to the three orders of earlier-diverging species known as the basal angiosperms: Nymphaeales (including water lilies), Austrobaileyales (including star anise), and Amborellales.
All spermatophytes ("seed plants") possess flowers as defined here (in a broad sense), but the internal organization of the flower is very different in the two main groups of spermatophytes: living gymnosperms and angiosperms. Gymnosperms may possess flowers that are gathered in strobili, or
Although at one time considered angiosperms because of their berry-like cupules, [5] that hypothesis was later disproven. [6] Nevertheless, some authorities consider them likely ancestors or close relatives of angiosperms. [7] The origin of angiosperms remains unclear, and they cannot be linked with any known seed plants groups with certainty.
The dicotyledons, also known as dicots (or, more rarely, dicotyls), [2] are one of the two groups into which all the flowering plants (angiosperms) were formerly divided. The name refers to one of the typical characteristics of the group: namely, that the seed has two embryonic leaves or cotyledons. There are around 200,000 species within this ...
The anthophytes are a paraphyletic grouping of plant taxa bearing flower-like reproductive structures. The group, once thought to be a clade , [ 1 ] contained the angiosperms – the extant flowering plants, such as roses and grasses – as well as the Gnetales and the extinct Bennettitales .
[citation needed] In the seed plants, the largest groups of which are the gymnosperms and flowering plants (angiosperms), the sporophyte phase is more prominent than the gametophyte, and is the familiar green plant with its roots, stem, leaves and cones or flowers.