Botany Botany, also called plant science, is the branch of natural science and biology studying plants, especially Plant anatomy, their anatomy, Plant taxonomy, taxonomy, and Plant ecology, ecology. A botanist or plant scientist is a scientist who s ...

is a natural science concerned with the study of

plant Plants are the eukaryotes that form the Kingdom (biology), kingdom Plantae; they are predominantly Photosynthesis, photosynthetic. This means that they obtain their energy from sunlight, using chloroplasts derived from endosymbiosis with c ...

s. The main branches of botany (also referred to as "plant science") are commonly divided into three groups: core topics, applied topics which study the ways in which plants may be used for economic benefit in horticulture, core topics which associate with agriculture and forestry concerned with the study of the fundamental natural phenomena and processes of plant life, the classification and description of plant diversity, and organismic topics which focus on plant groups such as algae, mosses or flowering plants.

Applied topics

Agronomy Agronomy is the science and technology of producing and using plants by agriculture for food, fuel, fiber, chemicals, recreation, or land conservation. Agronomy has come to include research of plant genetics, plant physiology, meteorology, and ...

– Application of plant science to crop production *

Arboriculture Arboriculture (, from ) is the cultivation, management, and study of individual trees, shrubs, vines, and other perennial woody plants. The science of arboriculture studies how these plants grow and respond to cultural practices and to their env ...

– Culture and propagation of trees * Astrobotany - The study of plants in space *

Biotechnology Biotechnology is a multidisciplinary field that involves the integration of natural sciences and Engineering Science, engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms and parts thereof for products and services. Specialists ...

– Use of plants to synthesize products * Dendrology – Study of woody plants, shrubs, trees and lianas * Economic botany – Study of plants of economic use or value *

Ethnobotany Ethnobotany is an interdisciplinary field at the interface of natural and social sciences that studies the relationships between humans and plants. It focuses on traditional knowledge of how plants are used, managed, and perceived in human socie ...

– Plants and people. Use and selection of plants by humans *

Floristics Floristics is the study of plants of geographical regions. It is a branch of phytogeography, which technically makes it a branch of botany, geography, and a subbranch of biogeography. Harvard University has a history of research with early contr ...

- The study of plants in a specific geographical region. *

Forestry Forestry is the science and craft of creating, managing, planting, using, conserving and repairing forests and woodlands for associated resources for human and Natural environment, environmental benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and ...

– Forest management and related studies *

Horticulture Horticulture (from ) is the art and science of growing fruits, vegetables, flowers, trees, shrubs and ornamental plants. Horticulture is commonly associated with the more professional and technical aspects of plant cultivation on a smaller and mo ...

– cultivation of garden plants * Marine botany – Study of aquatic plants and algae that live in seawater * Micropropagation – rapid propagation of plants using cell and tissue culture *

Pharming (genetics) Pharming, a portmanteau of ''farming'' and ''pharmaceutical'', refers to the use of genetic engineering to insert genes that code for useful pharmaceuticals into host animals or plants that would otherwise not express those genes, thus creating a g ...

– Genetic engineering of plants to produce pharmaceuticals *

Plant breeding Plant breeding is the science of changing the traits of plants in order to produce desired characteristics. It is used to improve the quality of plant products for use by humans and animals. The goals of plant breeding are to produce crop varie ...

– Breeding of plants with desirable genetic characters *

Plant pathology Plant pathology or phytopathology is the scientific study of plant diseases caused by pathogens (infectious organisms) and environmental conditions (physiological factors). Plant pathology involves the study of pathogen identification, disease ...

(Phytopathology) – Plant diseases *

Plant propagation Plant propagation is the process by which new plants grow from various sources, including seeds, Cutting (plant), cuttings, and other plant parts. Plant propagation can refer to both man-made and natural processes. Propagation typically occurs as ...

– propagation of plants from seed, bulbs, tubers, cuttings and grafting * Pomology – Fruit and nuts * Seed technology - Seed technology is the science dealing with the methods of improving physical and genetical characteristics of seed.

Core topics

Cytology Cell biology (also cellular biology or cytology) is a branch of biology that studies the structure, function, and behavior of cells. All living organisms are made of cells. A cell is the basic unit of life that is responsible for the living an ...

– cell structure *

Epigenetics In biology, epigenetics is the study of changes in gene expression that happen without changes to the DNA sequence. The Greek prefix ''epi-'' (ἐπι- "over, outside of, around") in ''epigenetics'' implies features that are "on top of" or "in ...

– Control of gene expression *

Paleobotany Paleobotany or palaeobotany, also known as paleophytology, is the branch of botany dealing with the recovery and identification of plant fossils from geological contexts, and their use for the biological reconstruction of past environments ( pal ...

– Study of fossil plants and plant evolution *

Palynology Palynology is the study of microorganisms and microscopic fragments of mega-organisms that are composed of acid-resistant organic material and occur in sediments, sedimentary rocks, and even some metasedimentary rocks. Palynomorphs are the mic ...

– Pollen and spores * Plant biochemistry – Chemical processes of primary and secondary metabolism *

Phenology Phenology is the study of periodic events in biological life cycles and how these are influenced by seasonal and interannual variations in climate, as well as habitat factors (such as elevation). Examples include the date of emergence of leav ...

– the timing of germination, flowering and fruiting *

Phytochemistry Phytochemistry is the study of phytochemicals, which are chemicals derived from plants. Phytochemists strive to describe the structures of the large number of secondary metabolites found in plants, the functions of these compounds in human and ...

– Plant secondary chemistry and chemical processes *

Phytogeography Phytogeography (from Greek φυτόν, ''phytón'' = "plant" and γεωγραφία, ''geographía'' = "geography" meaning also distribution) or botanical geography is the branch of biogeography that is concerned with the geographic distribution ...

– Plant

Biogeography Biogeography is the study of the species distribution, distribution of species and ecosystems in geography, geographic space and through evolutionary history of life, geological time. Organisms and biological community (ecology), communities o ...

, the study of plant distributions * Phytosociology – Plant communities and interactions *

Plant anatomy Plant anatomy or phytotomy is the general term for the study of the internal Anatomy, structure of plants. Originally, it included plant morphology, the description of the physical form and external structure of plants, but since the mid-20th centu ...

– Structure of

plant cell Plant cells are the cells present in Viridiplantae, green plants, photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Their distinctive features include primary cell walls containing cellulose, hemicelluloses and pectin, the presence of plastids ...

s and tissues * Plant ecology – Role and function of plants in the environment * Plant evolutionary developmental biology – Plant development from an evolutionary perspective * Plant genetics – Genetic inheritance in plants *

Plant morphology Phytomorphology is the study of the physical form and external structure of plants.Raven, P. H., R. F. Evert, & S. E. Eichhorn. ''Biology of Plants'', 7th ed., page 9. (New York: W. H. Freeman, 2005). . This is usually considered distinct from pl ...

– Structure of plants *

Plant physiology Plant physiology is a subdiscipline of botany concerned with the functioning, or physiology, of plants. Plant physiologists study fundamental processes of plants, such as photosynthesis, respiration, plant nutrition, plant hormone functions, tr ...

– Life functions of plants *

Plant reproduction Plants may reproduce sexually or asexually. Sexual reproduction produces offspring by the fusion of gametes, resulting in offspring genetically different from either parent. Vegetative reproduction produces new individuals without the fusion o ...

– Processes of plant reproduction * Plant systematics – Classification and naming of plants *

Plant taxonomy Plant taxonomy is the science that finds, identifies, describes, classifies, and names plants. It is one of the main branches of taxonomy (the science that finds, describes, classifies, and names living things). Plant taxonomy is closely allied ...

– Classification and naming of plants

Organismal topics

Groups of organisms — clades, grades and guilds

* Agrostology –

Poaceae Poaceae ( ), also called Gramineae ( ), is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos, the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivate ...

* Bryology –

Bryophyte Bryophytes () are a group of embryophyte, land plants (embryophytes), sometimes treated as a taxonomic Division (taxonomy), division referred to as Bryophyta ''Sensu#Common qualifiers, sensu lato'', that contains three groups of non-vascular pla ...

s * Citrology – ''

Citrus ''Citrus'' is a genus of flowering trees and shrubs in the family Rutaceae. Plants in the genus produce citrus fruits, including important crops such as oranges, mandarins, lemons, grapefruits, pomelos, and limes. ''Citrus'' is nativ ...

'' * Dendrology –

tree In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, e.g., including only woody plants with secondary growth, only ...

s * Lichenology –

lichen A lichen ( , ) is a hybrid colony (biology), colony of algae or cyanobacteria living symbiotically among hypha, filaments of multiple fungus species, along with yeasts and bacteria embedded in the cortex or "skin", in a mutualism (biology), m ...

s *

Mycology Mycology is the branch of biology concerned with the study of fungus, fungi, including their Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, genetics, biochemistry, biochemical properties, and ethnomycology, use by humans. Fungi can be a source of tinder, Edible ...

–

fungi A fungus (: fungi , , , or ; or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and mold (fungus), molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as one ...

* Orchidology –

Orchidaceae Orchids are plants that belong to the family (biology), family Orchidaceae (), a diverse and widespread group of flowering plants with blooms that are often colourful and fragrant. Orchids are cosmopolitan distribution, cosmopolitan plants that ...

* Phycology –

algae Algae ( , ; : alga ) is an informal term for any organisms of a large and diverse group of photosynthesis, photosynthetic organisms that are not plants, and includes species from multiple distinct clades. Such organisms range from unicellular ...

* Pteridology –

fern The ferns (Polypodiopsida or Polypodiophyta) are a group of vascular plants (plants with xylem and phloem) that reproduce via spores and have neither seeds nor flowers. They differ from mosses by being vascular, i.e., having specialized tissue ...

s * Synantherology –

Asteraceae Asteraceae () is a large family (biology), family of flowering plants that consists of over 32,000 known species in over 1,900 genera within the Order (biology), order Asterales. The number of species in Asteraceae is rivaled only by the Orchi ...

Study of chronological dating using plants

Acanthochronology Acanthochronology is the study of cactus Thorns, spines, and prickles, spines or ''Euphorbia'' Thorns, spines, and prickles, thorns grown in time ordered sequence (i.e. in series). Physical, morphological or chemical characteristics and information ...

–

Cactaceae A cactus (: cacti, cactuses, or less commonly, cactus) is a member of the plant family Cactaceae (), a family of the order Caryophyllales comprising about 127 genera with some 1,750 known species. The word ''cactus'' derives, through Latin, ...

Dendrochronology Dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) is the scientific method of chronological dating, dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed in a tree. As well as dating them, this can give data for dendroclimatology, ...

–

Wood Wood is a structural tissue/material found as xylem in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulosic fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin t ...

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