A leptoid is a type of elongated food-conducting cell like
phloem
Phloem (, ) is the living tissue in vascular plants that transports the soluble organic compounds made during photosynthesis and known as ''photosynthates'', in particular the sugar sucrose, to the rest of the plant. This transport process is ...
in the stems of some
moss
Mosses are small, non-vascular plant, non-vascular flowerless plants in the taxonomic phylum, division Bryophyta (, ) ''sensu stricto''. Bryophyta (''sensu lato'', Wilhelm Philippe Schimper, Schimp. 1879) may also refer to the parent group bryo ...
es, such as the family
Polytrichaceae
Polytrichaceae is a common family of mosses. Members of this family tend to be larger than other mosses, with the larger species occurring in particularly moist habitats. The leaves have specialized sheaths at the base and a midrib that bears pho ...
.
They surround strands of water-conducting
hydroids
Hydroids are a life stage for most animals of the class Hydrozoa, small predators related to jellyfish.
Some hydroids such as the freshwater '' Hydra'' are solitary, with the polyp attached directly to the substrate. When these produce buds, ...
. They have some structural and developmental similarities to the
sieve element
Sieve elements or sieve tube elements are specialized cells that are important for the function of phloem, which is a highly organized tissue that transports organic compounds made during photosynthesis. Sieve elements are the major conducting cell ...
s of seedless
vascular plants
Vascular plants (), also called tracheophytes (, ) or collectively tracheophyta (; ), are plants that have lignified tissues (the xylem) for conducting water and minerals throughout the plant. They also have a specialized non-lignified tissue ( ...
. At maturity they have inclined end cell walls with small pores and degenerate nuclei. The conduction cells of mosses, leptoids and hydroids, appear similar to those of fossil protracheophytes. However they're not thought to represent an intermediate stage in the evolution of plant vascular tissues but to have had an independent evolutionary origin.
[Renzaglia, K.S., Schette, S. and Duff, R.J. (2007) "Bryophyte phylogeny: advancing the molecular and morphological frontiers". ''Bryologist'', ''110'', 179-213.]
See also
*
Hydroid, a related water-transporting cell analogous the
xylem
Xylem is one of the two types of transport tissue (biology), tissue in vascular plants, the other being phloem; both of these are part of the vascular bundle. The basic function of the xylem is to transport water upward from the roots to parts o ...
of vascular plants
References
Mosses
Plant physiology
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