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Epiphytes, Parasites, and Carnivores02:40

Epiphytes, Parasites, and Carnivores

Plants often form mutualistic relationships with soil-dwelling fungi or bacteria to enhance their roots’ nutrient uptake ability. Root-colonizing fungi (e.g., mycorrhizae) increase a plant’s root surface area, which promotes nutrient absorption. While root-colonizing, nitrogen-fixing bacteria (e.g., rhizobia) convert atmospheric nitrogen (N2) into ammonia (NH3), making nitrogen available to plants for various biological functions. For example, nitrogen is essential for the...
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Light Acquisition02:16

Light Acquisition

In order to produce glucose, plants need to capture sufficient light energy. Many modern plants have evolved leaves specialized for light acquisition. Leaves can be only millimeters in width or tens of meters wide, depending on the environment. Due to competition for sunlight, evolution has driven the evolution of increasingly larger leaves and taller plants, to avoid shading by their neighbors with contaminant elaboration of root architecture and mechanisms to transport water and nutrients.
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Adaptations that Reduce Water Loss01:57

Adaptations that Reduce Water Loss

Though evaporation from plant leaves drives transpiration, it also results in loss of water. Because water is critical for photosynthetic reactions and other cellular processes, evolutionary pressures on plants in different environments have driven the acquisition of adaptations that reduce water loss.
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Predator-Prey Interactions02:39

Predator-Prey Interactions

Predators consume prey for energy. Predators that acquire prey and prey that avoid predation both increase their chances of survival and reproduction (i.e., fitness). Routine predator-prey interactions elicit mutual adaptations that improve predator offenses, such as claws, teeth, and speed, as well as prey defenses, including crypsis, aposematism, and mimicry. Thus, predator-prey interactions resemble an evolutionary arms race.
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Seedless Vascular Plants03:24

Seedless Vascular Plants

Seedless Vascular Plants Were the First Tall Plants on Earth
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Non-vascular Seedless Plants

The diverse plant life on Earth—consisting of nearly 400,000 species—can be divided into three broad categories based on biological characteristics: nonvascular, seedless vascular, and seed plants.
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