Overview and Contents

• Interweaves contemporary ideas with classical interpretations
• Refreshing style, advocating a more ecological and process-oriented approach to plant sciences
• Beautifully illustrated throughout with colour photographs

Plants are so much part of our environment that we often take them for granted, yet beautiful, fascinating and useful plants are everywhere, from isolated moss colonies on stone walls to vast complex communities within tropical rainforests. How did this array of form and habitat come about, and how do we humans interact with the plant kingdom? This unique new book provides a refreshing and stimulating consideration of these questions, and forms an essential textbook for plant science courses.

Coverage includes:

• the origin of photosynthetic organisms
• growth and differentiation
• interaction with the environment
• reproduction and dispersal
• phylogeny
• adaptation to habitat
• plant uses
• history of botanical study

About the authors

Martin Ingrouille is a senior lecturer in botany in the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London. He teaches and co-ordinates courses in plant science, evolutionary biology and conservation biology.

Bill Eddie is a lecturer in botany and ornithology for the Open Studies programme of the Office of Lifelong Learning at the University of Edinburgh.