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Land Plants

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Biological Innovations that Built the World

Abstract

Land plants (Embryophyta) appear in the fossil record from about 470 MYA. Phylogenomic analysis favours the Zygnematophyceae (Charophytes) as their closest algal relative. Early land plants probably inherited somatic desiccation tolerance (poikilohydry) from their charophycean ancestor. Major innovations underpinning plant terrestrialization include sporophyte interpolation in an ancestrally haplobiontic cycle and symbiotic association with mycorrhizal fungi. Poikilohydry and a unisporangiate sporophyte permanently dependent on the gametophyte are ancestral traits retained in extant bryophytes. The evolution of a branched, autonomous sporophyte led to the emergence of polysporangiophytes in Mid Silurian. Homeohydry (the control of water loss) and xylem (a lignified water-conducting tissue) gave polysporangiophytes access to a multitude of novel habitats and niches, driving a dramatic increase in the biological diversity and complexity of terrestrial ecosystems. Roots and leaves evolved multiple times during the Devonian. Seed evolution in Late Devonian severed ancestral dependence on liquid water for sexual reproduction. With the assistance of their fungal associates, land plants are powerful geochemical agents. Their diffusion caused a dramatic decline in carbon dioxide concentration and an unprecedented rise of oxygen. By reducing carbon dioxide level, land plants cooled the planet, creating the conditions for the establishment of the current climatic regime. Land plant cover increases local rainfall and is essential for long-term maintenance of climatic conditions favourable to life on continental masses.

The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago; the next best time is now.

(Confucius 551–479 BC)

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Rock weathering is a minor source of nutrients to life in aquatic environments because the establishment of chemical equilibria between reagents and products rapidly stops rock dissolution. Consequently, the main source of mineral nutrients to aquatic ecosystems, including the oceans, is nutrient leakage from emerged continental masses.

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  1. Department of Environmental, Biological and Pharmaceutical Sciences and Technologies, University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”, Caserta, Italy

    Roberto Ligrone

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Ligrone, R. (2019). Land Plants. In: Biological Innovations that Built the World. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-16057-9_11

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