bryophyte

bry·o·phyte  (br-ft)

n.

A plant of the Bryophyta, a division of photosynthetic, chiefly terrestrial, nonvascular plants, including the mosses, liverworts, and hornworts.

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bryo·phytic (-ftk) adj.

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bryophyte  (br-ft)

A member of a large group of seedless green plants including the mosses, liverworts, and hornworts. Bryophytes lack the specialized tissues xylem and phloem that circulate water and dissolved nutrients in the vascular plants. Bryophytes generally live on land but are mostly found in moist environments, for they have free-swimming sperm that require water for transport. In contrast to the vascular plants, the gametophyte (haploid) generation of bryophytes constitutes the larger plant form, while the small sporophyte (diploid) generation grows on or within the gametophyte and depends upon it for nutrition.

Thesaurus

Noun

1.

bryophyte - any of numerous plants of the division Bryophyta nonvascular plant Bryophyta, division Bryophyta - a division of nonflowering plants characterized by rhizoids rather than true roots and having little or no organized vascular tissue and showing alternation of generations between gamete-bearing forms and spore-bearing forms; comprises true mosses (Bryopsida) and liverworts (Hepaticopsida) and hornworts (Anthoceropsida) moss - tiny leafy-stemmed flowerless plants hepatic, liverwort - any of numerous small green nonvascular plants of the class Hepaticopsida growing in wet places and resembling green seaweeds or leafy mosses nonvascular organism - organisms without vascular tissue: e.g. algae, lichens, fungi, mosses