The Surprising Map of Plants

this video is sponsored by brilliant did you know an oak tree is way more closely related to a pumpkin than they are to pine trees look here are the Oaks next to the pumpkins and here are the pine trees all the way over here before I made this map I thought that all of the trees evolve from each other but it turns out the concept of a tree has evolved throughout history multiple times in this map of plants video I'm going to look at all of the different kinds of plants on Earth and how they're

all related to each other and I made this video with the help of the experts at the Royal Botanic Gardens queue here in London and like all of my map videos the post is available on my website dos maps.com as well as all of our professor astrocat books so if you want to get your hands on it that's where to go in this map I found the most sensible way of organizing all the plants was by how they've evolved so this map is really an evolutionary tree of all plant life based on our current understanding

and let's start at the beginning with the most ancient Plants algae algae is a name used to describe a wide range of different unrelated organisms that have the ability to generate energy through photosynthesis but not all of these are true Plants algae come in many different sizes from single cell varieties to multicellular seaweeds in fact all seaweeds are different kinds of algae although algae aren't just found in saltwater they can be found in fresh water and on land single celled algae known as diatoms and the multicellular brown algae are not considered true plants even so

they're very important to life as three4 of the oxygen in the atmosphere is made by tiny single celled phytoplankton red algae are the first big group of species considered to be in the plant kingdom under the current taxonomy containing about 6,000 species although there's another small group of around 15 species called glycophytes which may also have Evolved first but which one came first is still under debate so what exactly is a plant technically it's based on looking at a part of the cells called chloroplasts which do the photosynthesis in Plants these chloroplasts are surrounded by

two membranes which scientists think came from an ancient event where one cell ate another but the cell that got eaten didn't die they started working together and we Define all plants to have this kind of double membrane chloroplast and red algae and glycophytes have the double membrane chloroplast despite not having things we think are more plant-like like leaves roots or a stem the different colors of Ali come from the pigments they use to convert sunlight into energy green plants all use two types of chlorophyll known as chlorophyll A and B and these are the same

pigments used by green algae repite algae are a distinct group of green algae which are thought to include the closest relatives to the land plants the oldest fossil evidence of algae and possibly all life on Earth are found in 3.8 billion year old structures called stratales these algae were a kind of photosynthetic bacteria called cyan bacteria so these weren't plants but green algae and land plants share a common ancestor from 1 billion years ago very early on in the evolution of life on Earth let's move on to the land plants Brites contain mosses horn warts

and liver warts and are a crucial part of our understanding of the evolution of plants as they're considered to be very similar to the earliest land dwelling organisms on Earth which started to live on land from around 470 million years ago around 50 million years before animals they La many of the features of more modern plants like flowers or vascular tissues which are the parts of plants that transport water and nutrients like sugars around the plant but they do have root-like structures called riseo Brites typically grow in moist Shady environments because they can only collect

water and nutrients directly through their cells they love soaking up any water around some mosses can absorb 20 times their weight in water they also tend to be small typically around 3 to 6 cm in height because they don't have the rigidity and structure that other plants get from their vascular tissues the maximum height they can reach is only 60 cm tall now every plant will meet after this point has got a vascular structure based on the fossils we've discovered they first appeared around 420 million years ago a vascular plant has specialized tissues called xylm

and flm which transport water and nutrients throughout its structures these tissues are rigid and enable vascular plants to grow taller and more complex and the nonvascular plants we've seen so far now we get to Club mosses and ferns Club mosses aren't true mosses because they have a vascular structure but also Club mosses aren't ferns because they've got a different Leaf structure to Ferns and different DNA so they're stuck in the middle here on their own ferns include whisk ferns horse tails and leptosporangiate ferns or lepto ferns for short and these have many of the features

we're familiar with from Plants Roots a vascular structure and and true leaves called frons however they reproduce through spores and not seeds ferns are a diverse group with over 10,000 known species inhabiting various habitats worldwide even underwater the fossil record for Fern stretches back to 400 million years ago and the ancestors of today's ferns were giants towering up to 40 m in height the Earth was covered in forests of tree ferns these have mostly died out but some tree ferns are still with us today a quick side note for this map I can't physically include

every plant that exists so I've chosen a familiar representative for each major group of plants but from here onwards I'm going to include the scientific names that classify each group so if you want to find where your favorite plant sits on this map just look up its scientific classification and you should be able to place it from here on the plants don't use spores to reproduce but seeds this was a really important animportant step for the proliferation of plants a seed is made of a young embryo some nutritive tissue and an outer protective covering first

let's look at the gymnas sperms which today comprise the major groups of sads Ginko neum and conifers like Pines and spruces these first appear in the fossil record at around 390 million years ago gymnosperms reproduce through cones which come in male and female forms male con cones produce pollen while female cones contain ovules that develop into seeds upon fertilization and these are known as naked seeds CU they're not covered in anything like a fruit or a hard shell gymnosperms have well-developed vascular tissues enabling them to grow tall and thrive in various environments for example conifers

are adapted to cold and dry conditions with needle-like leaves to reduce water loss and sturdy cones for seed protection I just want to make a little side note on fungi which which naively seem like they're quite like plants but actually they're very different they don't photosynthesize and are genetically closer to animals than plants but they're very important to this map because most plants live in a symbiotic relationship with fungi called micor riser in this relationship the plant makes organic molecules by photosynthesis and gives them to the fungus in the form of sugars and lipids while

the fungus supplies the plant with water and minerals like phosphorus from the soil also when plants die fungi break them down and return the nutrients to the soil also lyans they're not plants either they're a partnership between algae and fungi but I'm getting sidetracked now I should probably do a map of fungi as well anyway because of the close relationship between fungi and plants I've drawn a micro risal Network as the background as it seemed fitting from now on we'll be looking at the angiosperms or FL powering plants which first appeared around 135 million years

ago they're now the most diverse and dominant group of land plants 910s of the world's plants have flowers and over 300,000 species of angiosperms are estimated to live on Earth today around 90% of flowers are adapted to be pollinated by animals who have also adapted to feed on the nectar or fruit in a symbiotic relationship pollen is the male reproductive cell so basically plant sperm and the female reproductive cell is called an egg when they meet they make an embryo which develops into a seed in the plant ovary the ovary then develops into a fruit

which encloses the seed this was a very successful evolutionary feature to both help protect seeds but also to disperse them when animals ate the fruits and pooed them out although this is just one method there are many other dispersal tactics on the outside of seeds like hairs or wings to be carried by the wind or hook to grab hold of animals we also need to talk about fruits because they're a little complicated so anything with a seed inside it is a fruit which is obvious for things like plums and berries people who say Tomatoes of

fruits are correct cuz they have seeds inside them but then they should also include things like cucumbers or pumpkins basically any fleshy edible thing with seeds in it is technically a fruit nuts are also fruits hard fruits containing in the seeds in a hard protective shell which is formed from the ovary wall Stone fruits like olives mangoes and peaches have got a seed inside the Hard pit in the middle and beans and peas they're all seeds and come in seed pods but we also have false fruits like apples and strawberries which don't form from the

plant ovary but from the top of the stem of the plant so apples and strawberries aren't technically fruits in fact they're things that look like seeds on the out side of strawberries are actually individual fruits and the word vegetable is a generic term because some vegetables are actually fruits like pumpkins but other vegetables come from other parts of the plant like potatoes or an underground stem and broccoli is actually a flower and kale or leaves okay back to the map and now let's explore the flowering plants we start with the early diverging types of flowering

plants those that appear early in the fossil record and which may give hints as to what the ancestral flowering plants might have looked like these include amberes which is a small group is it only contains a single species amberella tropodo then we have NY Alis which includes water lies and some other aquatic plants then we get a collection of families which include the peppers where we get our black pepper but this isn't the same as the pepper plant we get chili peppers from we'll meet that later then we have mag Olas and Laurels also known

as Bay trees where we get bay leaves from and it's what they made Laurel wreaths out of in ancient Rome and Greece these early diverging angiosperms are examples of what the very early flowering plants may have been like and studying these is valuable for helping to understand how different features in the flowering plants evolved now we get to a group called The monocots which developed somewhere between 140 to 125 million years ago the monocots contain pondweeds yams pans Lis orchids and irises spider lies Palms banana plants grasses and Brads like pineapples I want to highlight

grasses because this group includes all the cereal crops like corn wheat rice mazee barley and loads of other cultivated crops which basically make up around half of human food and cover a fifth of the earth's land the monocots contain about 85,000 species but incredibly nearly half of these are different types of orchid which have got around 30,000 different species and one of these gives us vanilla monocots are one of the two major groups of flowering plants everything else will meet meet from now on are on the other major kind of flowering plant called OTS the

UDOT are the most diverse group of plants today and appeared around 125 million years ago the UDOT are split into three different subsections the early diverging UDOT the rosids and the asterids the name monocot and UDOT come from how many leaves they sprout out of the ground monocots typically have one seedling Leaf when they first grow but the Udi cots have two this seedling Leaf is known as a Caledon so monocot is short for monoc Caledon for single seedling leaf and OTS are short for UDOT Alon for two seedling leaves also all UDOT share a

distinctive type of pollen which is described as triculate because it's got three characteristic grooves but a lot of the classification of plants into these different groups comes from looking at and finally combing through their DNA the early diverging Udi cots contain buttercups which are also related to poppies and chatis proteas like lotuses and Banas then we have gunas who have some of the biggest plant leaves in the world which can be as wide as a double bed then there are mistletoes and then spiky cacti whose needle-like spines are actually hard pointy leaves cacti are also

related to the carnivorous venus fly trap but carnivorous plants aren't unique to this group there are over 700 species of plant that catch and kill animals they typically live in environments with poor boggy soil so they evolved many strategies to get their minerals from their victims by trapping and absorbing them with fast closing Jaws or sticky flowers or slick drowning pools that can trap animals as big as mice and small rats then we have the saxifrages which contain Stone crops peonies witch Hazels and gooseb which have only recently been recognized as being related based on

DNA evidence although it's still a mystery how the saxifrages are related to the other groups the rosids appeared around 100 million years ago and their 90,000 species are now found all over the world the major groups in the rosids are grape Vines geraniums fuches which are also related to pomeg Grits then we have passion Vines which are also related to poinas and violets then wood Sorels and Roses which are also related to figs and cannabis then the legumes which include peas and beans then Oaks which are related to walnut trees and then all the squash

plants like pumpkins then we have the hibiscuses which are also related to the cacao tree where we get get chocolate from then we have the maples which are also related to horse chestnuts and finally one of the most important groups for our food the brasas which contain mustard and a single species of plant called Brasa olaia which by artificial selection humans have turned into cabbage broccoli cauliflower brussels sprouts kale collard greens kabi Gan and many more new ones like purple sprouting broccoli all from a single species from within this group so the Roos sits are

clearly very important for our food and interestingly there are more than 880,000 edible plants in the world but 90% of the food we eat comes from just 30 plants the other plants are either inedible or actively toxic in fact there are more toxic plants than non-toxic plants land plants develop toxic chemicals as a defense to protect them from getting eaten mainly cuz they can't run away also some plants use sharp Thorns or spiky leaves like these Holly and others like stinging nettles use stings which act like hypodermic needles to inject painful chemicals with around 100,000

species the asteroids are as diverse and as widespread as the rosids the asteroids appeared around 89 million years ago and contain dogwoods and the related hyd Ranger then we have roded endons which is also where we find tea and then we have the coffees which are also related to gensin then forget me nots mints then potatoes which are also related to obene morning glories and the Chili Peppers we also have holles and carrots which used to be white and inedible before being bred in today's orange ones then we have ivis honeysuckles and viburnums and finally

asteres which contain sunflowers and dandelion and is where the name asteroids comes from interestingly a sunflower is not just one flower but many hundreds of flowers called florettes which each ripen into an individual seed so that's the map of plants video I hope you found it insightful and a very special thanks to the people at Q for helping me with the research on this video and also letting me film in their absolutely spectacular Gardens if you've watched my channel before you know I've delved into many different areas but I can only ever go so far

in 20 minutes so if your brain is hungry for more I can really recommend the sponsor of this video brilliant I love using brilliant to learn new subjects using their fun interactive lessons whenever I have a bit of downtime and want to do something productive with my brain for me I found it a fun test of my understanding by actually trying to solve problems which has been shown to be much more effective for people to learn a new subject compared to just watching videos in just say 15 minutes a day you can actually properly learn

physics mathematics programming and many other subjects and Brilliant does a great job at customizing the content to fit your level letting you solve problems at your own pace where it's totally okay to not know everything and make lots of mistakes you can take a quiz when you sign up and you'll be matched with content that fits your interests and level from very beginner all the way up to writing programs for a quantum computer which is actually one of the courses I've been enjoying recently I'm very lucky that I get to constantly learn new things as

part of this YouTube job because it's so satisfying to expand my knowledge and this is also why I love using brilliant to try everything brilliant has to offer free for a full 30 days visit brilliant.org Doos or click on the link in the description and the first 200 of you will get 20% off brilliant annual premium subscription thanks to you for watching and I'll see you on the next map video I've got some really good ones lined up