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The precursor to the male angiosperm gametophyte is a diploid microspore mother cell located inside the anther. Once the microspore undergoes meiosis, 4 haploid cells are formed, each of which is a singled celled male gametophyte. The male gametophyte will develop via one or two rounds of mitosis inside the anther.
The male gametophyte gives rise to sperm cells, which are used for fertilization of an egg cell to form a zygote. Megaspores are structures that are part of the alternation of generations in many seedless vascular cryptogams, all gymnosperms and all angiosperms.
The pollen tube acts as a conduit to transport the male gamete cells from the pollen grain—either from the stigma (in flowering plants) to the ovules at the base of the pistil or directly through ovule tissue in some gymnosperms. In maize, this single cell can grow longer than 12 inches (30 cm) to traverse the length of the pistil.
Each male gametophyte typically consists of two to four cells enclosed within the protective wall of a pollen grain. The sporophyte of a flowering plant is often described using sexual terms (e.g. "female" or "male") based on the sexuality of the gametophyte it gives rise to. For example, a sporophyte that produces spores that give rise only to ...
The sterile cells may form a central support structure or surround the spermatogenous tissue as a protective jacket. The spermatogenous cells give rise to spermatids via mitotic cell division . In some bryophytes , the antheridium is borne on an antheridiophore , a stalk-like structure that carries the antheridium at its apex.
The gametophyte is the multicellular structure (plant) that is haploid, containing a single set of chromosomes in each cell. The gametophyte produces male or female gametes (or both), by a process of cell division, called mitosis. In vascular plants with separate gametophytes, female gametophytes are known as mega gametophytes (mega=large, they ...
An archegonium (pl.: archegonia), from the Ancient Greek ἀρχή ("beginning") and γόνος ("offspring"), is a multicellular structure or organ of the gametophyte phase of certain plants, producing and containing the ovum or female gamete. The corresponding male organ is called the antheridium. The archegonium has a long neck canal or ...
Pollen itself is not the male gamete. [4] It is a gametophyte, something that could be considered an entire organism, which then produces the male gamete.Each pollen grain contains vegetative (non-reproductive) cells (only a single cell in most flowering plants but several in other seed plants) and a generative (reproductive) cell.