Cereal
A cereal is a grass cultivated for its edible grain, which is harvested as a staple food or processed into foods and drinks.
Caryopsis: A dry, one-seeded fruit in which the seed coat is fused to the fruit wall, as in grasses. Each cereal grain is a caryopsis, with fruit wall and seed coat joined.
Wheat: A cereal grass cultivated for grain used chiefly in flour, bread, pasta, and other foods. Its grain is especially suited to leavened bread and many flour-based foods.
Grain: A small, hard seed or fruit harvested as food, especially from cereal grasses. The edible cereal harvest is grain, a food form shared by several crop groups.
Domestication: The process by which humans alter wild organisms over generations through cultivation, breeding, or management. Cereal crops emerged as people selected and cultivated useful wild grasses.
Agrarian society: A society whose economy and daily life depend substantially on agriculture. Reliable cereal harvests supported settled populations and agricultural economies.
Endosperm: The seed tissue that stores nutrients for an embryo, forming most of the kernel in many cereal grains. This starch-rich part supplies most of the flour in refined cereal products.
Rice: A cereal grass cultivated for seeds that are eaten as a staple by billions of people. Rice is a major staple cereal, often grown in flooded paddy fields.
Tillering: The production of side shoots from the base of a grass plant. Cereal tillers can develop into grain-bearing stems, affecting yield.
Fertile Crescent: A region of Southwest Asia where early farming and several crop domestications began. Wheat and barley cultivation began in this region during the Neolithic.
Granary: A building or facility designed to store harvested grain. Stored cereal grain helps bridge the gap between harvests.