Knowra Bryophyte Bryophyte A bryophyte is a nonvascular land plant, including mosses, liverworts, and hornworts. Its life cycle is dominated by a photosynthetic gametophyte, while the attached sporophyte depends on it.
Alternation of generations : A life cycle that alternates between multicellular haploid and diploid stages. Bryophytes alternate generations, with the haploid gametophyte as the conspicuous stage.
Bryophyte reproduction : The reproductive processes by which bryophytes produce gametes, embryos, and spores. It connects water-dependent fertilization to the production of dispersible spores.
Moss : A small, nonvascular land plant whose leafy shoots usually grow from a protonema. Mosses are the most familiar bryophytes and display the group's dominant gametophyte stage.
Peat : An accumulation of partly decomposed organic matter formed in waterlogged environments. Peat forms largely from Sphagnum and other plants, storing carbon in bryophyte-rich wetlands.
Plant : A multicellular eukaryote in the green plant lineage, including land plants and green algae. Bryophytes are land plants within the broader plant lineage.
Gametophyte : The multicellular haploid stage of a plant life cycle that produces gametes. This is the dominant, usually independent plant body in bryophytes.
Antheridium : The male gametangium that produces sperm in many plants and algae. Bryophyte antheridia release flagellated sperm that swim toward eggs.
Liverwort : A nonvascular land plant in the division Marchantiophyta, with leafy or flattened forms. Liverworts include both leafy shoots and flat thalli among bryophytes.
Peatland : A wetland ecosystem where peat accumulates faster than it decomposes. Bryophytes, especially Sphagnum, help create and maintain many peatlands.
Embryophyte : A land plant that protects a multicellular embryo within tissues of the parent organism. Bryophytes belong to the land plants, or embryophytes, alongside vascular plants.
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