Last week we presented a general outline of how trees lift water. Therefore, plants have developed an effective system to absorb, translocate, store and utilize water. To understand water transport in plants, one first needs to understand the plants' plumbing.
Plants contain a vast network of conduits, which consists of xylem and phloem tissues.
This pathway of water and nutrient transport can be compared with the vascular system that transports blood throughout the human body. Like the vascular system in people, the xylem and phloem tissues extend throughout the plant. These conducting tissues start in the roots and transect up through the trunks of trees, branching off into the branches and then branching even further into every leaf. The phloem tissue is made of living elongated cells that are connected to one another. The xylem is also composed of elongated cells.