h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

how dare they
My country is currently in a big mess, due to my packing of my clothes

Unc, I'm sorry to be a pest, but I heard some absurd rumours that plants don't classify like animals. They get divided into sort of five phyla, and that's about it. Is that true?

But http://www.itis.usda.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=23041 goes completely against that....

I'm confused again.....

The problem about taxonomy is that there is no set order to it.. some people use one system, others another; there is no set standard. Normally there are 5 groups though.. Lower plants, such as moss then your higher plants..

These are divided into flowering (most plant species), and non-flowering. The flowering are then divided into dicots (eg most flowering plants) and monocots (basically grasses)

..I'll have to dig up my notes for the spellings of the scientific names however

fond it, put just realised what you're studying! *hits self over head with *

Arabidopsis! I'd forgotten its common name! I've done weeks worth of stuff on this, it is, afterall, the base plant for plant genetics... What do you need to know?

Anyway, the phylum for plants are..

Bryopyta (liverworts and mosses)
Lycopodophyta (clubmosses)
Sphenophyta (horsetails)
Filicinophyta (ferns)

those are all the lower plants

then it gets complex... next are the gymnosperms, the non-flowering higher plants
Cycadophyta (cycads)
Gingophta (ginkgo)
Coniferophyta (conifers)

now your flowering plants, phylum angiospermophyta
sub-phyla monocotyledonae (monocot for short), and dicotoledonae

Where does it live? I have enough info on it (largely, a big thanks, to you) but I don't know where it lives. Is it mainly in temperate zones?

Arabidopsis? Almost everywhere, it's the most widely spread higher plant there is.. It grow on every continent (not sure about antartica however ).
It's a dicot, but is very similar to a monocot genetically, which means that work done on it can be applied to other plants..

Life cycle 6 weeks
Hight about 15cm


etc, etc

This is invaluable. I have 2000 words to do, and I had despaired of finding any detailed information about a plant.

Have you ever considered writing a guide entry about it? Or would that be too boring?

Actually, I've written half of one, and then gave up because I didn't think anyone would be interested in it..

When does your project need to be done for, I might just finish the article..

Just a sec and I'll find you the link to the main Arabidopsis research station...

www.arabidopsis.org

You star .

It had to be in for today, but I was "ill". But I think it would be interesting to finish the article in any case, I'd certainly give it a read.

How I managed to forget the web address is beyond me however..

I may well finish the article

Yes, well, you may have suppressed it, being heartily sick of it.

true

I'm not understanding all this Biology, but it sounds really impressive . My mother just invaded my room and stole the bacteria I was growing in a glass. They were probably pathogenic, since the glass came from when I had a streaming cold and sore throat, and I was saving them as a weapon against the penguins etc. I guess that's one more line of defence down. My intelligence sources tell me that a german girl is going to invade the People's Republic of Sirmio on the 5th of July, as part of a so-called 'exchange program' The president (me) will be forced into exile for 10 days .

Maybe the penguins will help defend your room against invasion..

Unc, do you know a good site for bladderwrack? Or is that not your field?

Looked at transitions of wracks on rocky shores on the field trip.. bladder wrack was one of them. May have something in the notes

You are doing 1/3 of my biology project for me..... I am profusely grateful.

Looking up the latin name and something clicks again..

fucus vesiculosus

the eggs are used in tropism experiments..