Bryophytes include mosses, liverworts, and hornworts. They are non-vascular plants that lack true roots, stems, or leaves. Bryophytes reproduce both sexually through an alternation of generations involving gametophytes and sporophytes, and asexually through fragmentation or structures like gemmae. The dominant generation is the gametophyte. Mosses commonly grow in dense colonies on soil, rocks, and trees, helping to form soil and prevent erosion. Liverworts have a thallus shape and reproduce using gemmae cups. Hornworts have thalloid bodies and hornlike sporophyte projections. Bryophytes play various ecological roles and some have human uses as well.

1. The Bryophytes
Mosses, Liverworts, & Hornworts
Damnjanović Ivana

2. Introduction

Bryophyte is a traditional name used to refer to
all land plants that do not have true vascular tissue
and are therefore called "non-vascular plants"

They have no wood to lend them structural
support, nor do they have large leaves or showy
cones or flowers

3. 
This does not mean that mosses are not
important; in fact, mosses play important
roles in reducing erosion along streams,
water and nutrient cycling in tropical forests,
and insulating.

4. 
Bryophytes are gametophyte dominant, meaning
that the more prominent, longer-lived plant is the
haploid gametophyte.

The diploid sporophytes appear only occasionally
and remain attached to and nutritionally
dependent on the gametophyte.

5. Sporangium and Spores

6. 
Absence of specialized tissues for transporting water and
dissolved food throughout the organism limits terrestrial
forms to being very short plants, since the only way to
move substances through the plant body is by osmosis
and diffusion from surface moisture.

Bryophytes do not have roots, but have rhizoids, which
are relatively simple, sometimes multicellular filaments
of thin-walled cells

8. Reproduction and Life cycle
Vegetative reproduction

A piece that breaks off a gametophyte and then
lands in a suitable habitat will grow into a new
gametophyte .

The breakage may be accidental, such as animal
trampling or erosion leading to fragmentation of
an existing bryophyte colony.

9. Sexual Reproduction

This cycle of fertilization and meiosis involves an
alternation of generations between the haploid gamete
-producing stage (gametophyte) and the diploid
organism (sporophyte).

In the bryophytes, it is the haploid gametophyte that
produces the leaves and thali and therefore
predominates.

11. 
The process requires the production of male
gametes (sperm), female gametes (eggs) and some
means of getting the sperm to the eggs.

The gametes are produced on the gametophytes.

The sperm are produced within tiny, typically
stalked, club-shaped structures called antheridia.

Each antheridium produces numerous sperm.

12. 
The eggs are produced in tiny, typically somewhat
flask-like structures called archegonia.

Each archegonium holds one egg (in a swollen section
called the venter).

The sperm enter through the channel in the narrower,
tubular section (or neck).

13. 
A fertilized egg in an archegonium develops into the
sporophyte.

The sporophyte consists of a spore-containing capsule
which, depending on the species, may be stalked or
stalkless. Each spore contains a mix of genes from the
two parents and on successful germination will give
rise to a new gametophyte.

15. Bryphytes
• 3 types of Bryophytes
Mosses
Liverworts
Hornworts

16. Mosses

17. Mosses
• Location: soil, rocks, tree bark
• Help form soil
• Colonize rocky sites
• Prevent soil erosion
– Grow packed together in dense colonies

18. 
The Moss Body
− Thallus – Body structure
− Rhizoids – hair-like absorptive structures
− Do not have TRUE roots, stems, or leaves
-Many mosses have separate sexes: male plants and
female plants
-The gametophyte generation is dominant

19. Sphagnum sp.

21. Polytrichum commune

22. Mnium undulatum

23. Liverworts
• Thallus
– A body that lacks roots, stems, or leaves
– Liverworts get their name from their
liver shaped thallus
• Gemmae
– Asexual reproductive structure of
liverworts
– Borne in a saucer-shaped structure –
gemmae cup

25. Marchantia polymorpha

27. -Location: fields &
roadsides
-Thalloids - 1-2 cm
-Sporophyte
generations form
hornlike
projections out of
the gametophyte
thallus
Hornworts

30. Uses of Bryophytes

Medicine

Cosmetics

Food for animals

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