Stamen

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Stamen

The stamen (plural

Plural

Plural is a grammatical number, typically referring to more than one of the referent in the real world. In the English language, singular and plural are the only grammatical numbers....
stamina or stamens, from Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
stamen meaning "thread of the warp

Warp (weaving)

In weaving, the warp is the set of lengthwise yarns through which the weft is woven. Each individual warp thread in a fabric is called a warp end....
") is the male organ

Organ (anatomy)

In biology, an organ is a biological tissue that performs a specific function or group of functions. Usually there is a main tissue and sporadic tissues....
of a flower

Flower

A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproduction structure found in flowering plants . The biological function of a flower is to mediate the union of male sperm with female ovum in order to produce seeds....
. Each stamen generally has a stalk called the filament (from Latin filum, meaning "thread"), and, on top of the filament, an anther (from Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the historical stage in the development of the Greek language spanning across the Archaic Greece , Classical Greece , and Hellenistic civilization periods of ancient Greece and the classical antiquity....
anthera, feminine of antheros "flowery," from anthos "flower"), and pollen

Pollen

Pollen is a fine to coarse powder consisting of Gametophyte , which produce the male gametes of spermatophyta. A hard coat covering the pollen grain protects the sperm cells during the process of their movement between the stamens of the flower to the pistil of the next flower....
sacs, called microsporangia
Sporangium

A sporangium is a plant or fungus structure producing and containing spores. Sporangia occur in Flowering plant, gymnosperms, ferns, fern allies, bryophytes, Algaee, and Fungus....
.

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Encyclopedia

The stamen (plural

Plural

Latin

Warp (weaving)

In weaving, the warp is the set of lengthwise yarns through which the weft is woven. Each individual warp thread in a fabric is called a warp end....
") is the male organ

Organ (anatomy)

In biology, an organ is a biological tissue that performs a specific function or group of functions. Usually there is a main tissue and sporadic tissues....
of a flower

Flower

Ancient Greek

Pollen

Gametophyte

In plants and algae that undergo alternation of generations, a gametophyte is the multicellular structure, or phase, that is haploid, containing a single set of chromosomes:...
s, (called pollen-grains

Pollen

Gymnosperm

Gymnosperm is a group of spermatophyte seed-bearing plants with ovules on scales, which are usually arranged in cone-like structures. The other major group of seed-bearing plants, the angiosperms, [from the Greek, 'angion' - container] have ovules enclosed in a carpel, a sporophyll with fused margins....
s or heterosporous fern

Fern

A fern is any one of a group of about 20,000 species of plants classified in the phylum or division Pteridophyta, also known as Filicophyta....
s. The pollen is set free by the opening (dehiscence) of the anther, generally by means of longitudinal slits, but sometimes by pores, as in the heath

Erica

Erica is a genus of over 700 species of flowering plants in the family Ericaceae. The English common names "heath" and "heather" are shared by some closely related genera of similar appearance....
family (Ericaceae

Ericaceae

The plant family Ericaceae are mostly calcium oxide-hating plants that thrive in acid soils. Many well-known plants of the Ericaceae live in temperate climates, such as cranberry, blueberry, Erica, Calluna vulgaris, huckleberry, azalea and rhododendron....
), or by valves, as in the barberry family (Berberidaceae

Berberidaceae

Berberidaceae is a family of 15 genera flowering plants commonly called the barberry family. This family is in the order Ranunculales. The family contains about 570 species, of which the majority are in Berberis....
). It is then dropped, or carried by some external agent — wind, water or some member of the animal kingdom

Kingdom (biology)

In Biology taxonomy, kingdom or regnum is a taxonomic rank in either the highest rank, or the Rank below domain . Each kingdom is divided into smaller groups called Phylum ....
— onto the receptive surface of the carpel of the same or another flower, which is thus pollinated

Pollination

Pollination in flowering plants and gymnosperms is the process that transfers pollen, which contain the male gametes to where the female gamete are contained within the carpel; in gymnosperms the pollen is directly applied to the ovule itself....
.

Typical flowers have six stamens inside a perianth (the petal
Petal

A petal is one member or part of the Corolla of a flower. The corolla is the name for all of the petals of a flower; the inner perianth whorl, term used when this is not the same in appearance as the outermost whorl and is used to attract pollinators based on its advertising coloration....
s and sepal
Sepal

A sepal is a part of the flower of angiosperms . Sepals in a "typical" flower are green and lie under the more conspicuous petals. As a collective unit the sepals are called the Wiktionary:calyx, and the collection of petals is called the Wiktionary:corolla....
s together), arranged in a whorl around the carpel (pistil). But in some species there are many more than six present in a flower (see, for example, the spider tree flower, below). Collectively, the stamens are called an androecium (from Greek

Greek language

Greek is an Indo-European languages native to the southern Balkan peninsula, the language of the Greek people. It forms an independent branch within Indo-European....
andros oikia: man's house). The anthers are bilocular, i.e. they have two locules. Each locule contains a microsporangium. The tissue between the locules and the cells is called the connective. In an immature, unopened flower bud

Bud

In botany, a bud is an undeveloped or Plant embryogenesis shoot and normally occurs in the axil of a leaf or at the tip of the Plant stem. Once formed, a bud may remain for some time in a dormant condition, or it may form a shoot immediately....
, the filaments are still short. Their function is then to transport nutrient

Nutrient

A nutrient is a chemical that an organism needs to live and grow or a substance used in an organism's metabolism which must be taken in from its environment....
s to the developing pollen. They start to lengthen once the bud opens.

Descriptive terms

The anther can be attached to the filament in two ways:

basifixed : attached at its base to the filament; this gives rise to a longitudinal dehiscence (opening along its length to release pollen)
versatile : attached at its center to the filament; pollen is then released through pores (poricidal dehiscence).

Stamens can be connate (fused or joined in the same whorl):

monadelphous : fused into a single, compound structure
diadelphous : joined partially into two androecial structures
synantherous : only the anthers are connate (such as in the Asteraceae
Asteraceae

The family Asteraceae or Compositae is the largest family of flowering plants, in terms of number of species.The name 'Asteraceae' is derived from the type genus Aster , while 'Compositae', an older but still valid name, means composite and refers to the characteristic inflorescence, a special type of pseudanthium found in o...
)

Stamens can also be adnate (fused or joined from more than one whorl):

epipetalous : adnate to the corolla
didynamous : occurring in two pairs of different length
tetradynamos : occurring as a set of six filaments with two shorter ones
exserted : extending beyond the corolla
included : not extending from the corolla.

Stamen

Descriptive terms

Plant sexuality