Plants belonging to the Angiosperms form two classes, the monocotyledonous plants, or Monocots , and the dicotyledonous plants, or Dicots . You will study one example of each to learn the structure of the vegetative plant body. In addition, you will examine properties of pigments found in chloroplasts. We will use the common bean plant , a dicot that is relatively easy to grow, to introduce you to the external structure of flowering plants. As the name dicot indicates, these plants have two cotyledons.
Cotyledons are seed leaves.
In addition, Dicots often have leaves with veins arranged in a network of branches and one central, major root known as a tap root. Bean plants of different ages are provided so you can examine the maturation process and also so that you can make observations on the location and rates of growth. We will use corn , Zea mays , known as maize in much of the world, as our example of a monocot. We have corn seeds and seedlings 1,2,3,4 and 5 weeks old available for study. Monocots often have leaves with veins arranged in a parallel pattern and the root sytem is often shallow and fibrous .