An Introduction to Plant Structure and Development

Charles B. Beck, Professor Emeritus, received the PhD degree from Cornell University where he developed an intense interest in the structure of fossil and living plants under the influence of Professor Harlan Banks and Professor Arthur Eames. Following post-doctoral study with Professor John Walton at Glasgow University in Scotland, he joined the faculty of the University of Michigan. At Michigan he served one term each as Chairman of the Department of Botany and Director of the Museum of Paleontology. He also served one year as President of the International Organization of Paleobotany. His graduate students pursued research in either plant structure and development or paleobotany. He taught courses in plant anatomy, plant morphology and paleobotany over a period of 35 years.

1. Problems of adaptation to a terrestrial environment; 2. An overview of plant structure and development; 3. The protoplast of the eukaryotic cell; 4. Structure and development of the cell wall; 5. Meristems of the shoot and their roles in plant structure and development; 6. Morphology and development of the primary vascular system of the stem; 7. Sympodial systems and patterns of nodal anatomy; 8. The epidermis; 9. The origin of secondary tissue systems and the effect of their formation on the primary body of seed plants; 10. The vascular cambium: structure and function; 11. Secondary xylem; 12. The phloem; 13. Periderm, rhytidome, and the nature of bark; 14. Unusual features of structure and development in stems and roots; 15. Secretion in plants; 16. The root; 17. The leaf; 18. Reproduction and the origin of the sporophyte.