1.
Illicium verum
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Illicium verum is a medium-sized evergreen tree native to northeast Vietnam and southwest China. Star anise oil is a fragrant oil used in cooking, perfumery, soaps, toothpastes, mouthwashes. About 90% of the star anise crop is used for extraction of shikimic acid. Illicium comes from the Latin illicio meaning entice, in Persian, star anise is called بادیان bādiyān, hence its French name badiane. Star anise contains anethole, the ingredient that gives the unrelated anise its flavor. Recently, star anise has come into use in the West as an expensive substitute for anise in baking, as well as in liquor production. It is also used in the production of sambuca, pastis, Star anise enhances the flavour of meat. It is used as a spice in preparation of biryani and masala chai all over the Indian subcontinent and it is widely used in Chinese cuisine, and in Indian cuisine where it is a major component of garam masala, and in Malay and Indonesian cuisines. It is widely grown for use in China, India. Star anise is an ingredient of the traditional five-spice powder of Chinese cooking and it is also a major ingredient in the making of phở, a Vietnamese noodle soup. It is also used in the French recipe of mulled wine, called vin chaud. If allowed to steep in coffee, it deepens and enriches the flavor and this pods can be reused in this manner, by the pot-full or cup, many times as the ease of extraction of the gustatory components increases with the permeation of hot water. Star anise is the source of the chemical compound shikimic acid. Shikimic acid is produced by most autotrophic organisms, and whilst it can be obtained in commercial quantities elsewhere, in 2005, a temporary shortage of star anise was caused by its use in the production of Tamiflu. Later that year, a method for the production of shikimic acid using bacteria was discovered, roche now derives some of the raw material it needs from fermentation by E. coli bacteria. The 2009 swine flu outbreak led to series of shortages, as stocks of Tamiflu were built up around the world. Star anise is grown in four provinces in China and harvested between March and May and it is also found in the south of New South Wales. The shikimic acid is extracted from the seeds in a 10-stage manufacturing process takes a year. In traditional Chinese medicine, star anise is considered a warm and moving herb, japanese star anise, a similar tree, is highly toxic and inedible, in Japan, it has instead been burned as incense
2.
Illicium anisatum
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Illicium anisatum, with common names Japanese star anise, aniseed tree, and sacred anise tree, known in Japan as Shikimi, is a tree closely related to the Chinese star anise. Since it is toxic, the fruit is not edible, instead. Its branches and evergreen leaves are considered sacred by Japanese Buddhists due to its ability to remain fresh after pruning, Illicium anisatum is native to Japan. It is similar to I. verum, but its fruit is smaller and with weaker odor, while it is poisonous and therefore unsuitable for using internally, it is used for treatment of some skin problems in traditional Chinese medicine. Additionally, due to its poisonous nature it has used to kill fish. Another nickname for the shrub is Kono-Hana due to strong incense scent, Japanese star anise contains anisatin, shikimin, and sikimitoxin, which cause severe inflammation of the kidneys, urinary tract, and digestive organs. Other compounds present in species of Illicium are safrole and eugenol. Shikimi gave its name to shikimic acid, a substance present in the plant. Cases of illness, including serious neurological effects such as seizures and it is impossible to distinguish Chinese and Japanese star anise in its dried or processed form by its appearance only, due to morphological similarities between the species. Cases of product recalls have been reported when products containing star anise were found to be contaminated by Japanese anise, cases of consumers admitted to hospital with neurological symptoms after ingesting excessive doses of star anise or smaller doses of products adulterated with Japanese anise were described, as well. The essential oil of air-dried I. anisatum obtained by hydrodistillation was analyzed by GC–MS, fifty-two components were identified in the essential oil, and the main component was eucalyptol. Anisatin and its derivatives are suspected of acting as strong GABA antagonists
3.
Taxonomy (biology)
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Taxonomy is the science of defining groups of biological organisms on the basis of shared characteristics and giving names to those groups. The exact definition of taxonomy varies from source to source, but the core of the remains, the conception, naming. There is some disagreement as to whether biological nomenclature is considered a part of taxonomy, the broadest meaning of taxonomy is used here. The word taxonomy was introduced in 1813 by Candolle, in his Théorie élémentaire de la botanique, the term alpha taxonomy is primarily used today to refer to the discipline of finding, describing, and naming taxa, particularly species. In earlier literature, the term had a different meaning, referring to morphological taxonomy, ideals can, it may be said, never be completely realized. They have, however, a value of acting as permanent stimulants. Some of us please ourselves by thinking we are now groping in a beta taxonomy, turrill thus explicitly excludes from alpha taxonomy various areas of study that he includes within taxonomy as a whole, such as ecology, physiology, genetics, and cytology. He further excludes phylogenetic reconstruction from alpha taxonomy, thus, Ernst Mayr in 1968 defined beta taxonomy as the classification of ranks higher than species. This activity is what the term denotes, it is also referred to as beta taxonomy. How species should be defined in a group of organisms gives rise to practical and theoretical problems that are referred to as the species problem. The scientific work of deciding how to define species has been called microtaxonomy, by extension, macrotaxonomy is the study of groups at higher taxonomic ranks, from subgenus and above only, than species. While some descriptions of taxonomic history attempt to date taxonomy to ancient civilizations, earlier works were primarily descriptive, and focused on plants that were useful in agriculture or medicine. There are a number of stages in scientific thinking. Early taxonomy was based on criteria, the so-called artificial systems. Later came systems based on a complete consideration of the characteristics of taxa, referred to as natural systems, such as those of de Jussieu, de Candolle and Bentham. The publication of Charles Darwins Origin of Species led to new ways of thinking about classification based on evolutionary relationships and this was the concept of phyletic systems, from 1883 onwards. This approach was typified by those of Eichler and Engler, the advent of molecular genetics and statistical methodology allowed the creation of the modern era of phylogenetic systems based on cladistics, rather than morphology alone. Taxonomy has been called the worlds oldest profession, and naming and classifying our surroundings has likely been taking place as long as mankind has been able to communicate
4.
Plant
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Plants are mainly multicellular, predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. The term is generally limited to the green plants, which form an unranked clade Viridiplantae. This includes the plants, conifers and other gymnosperms, ferns, clubmosses, hornworts, liverworts, mosses and the green algae. Green plants have cell walls containing cellulose and obtain most of their energy from sunlight via photosynthesis by primary chloroplasts and their chloroplasts contain chlorophylls a and b, which gives them their green color. Some plants are parasitic and have lost the ability to produce amounts of chlorophyll or to photosynthesize. Plants are characterized by sexual reproduction and alternation of generations, although reproduction is also common. There are about 300–315 thousand species of plants, of which the great majority, green plants provide most of the worlds molecular oxygen and are the basis of most of Earths ecologies, especially on land. Plants that produce grains, fruits and vegetables form humankinds basic foodstuffs, Plants play many roles in culture. They are used as ornaments and, until recently and in variety, they have served as the source of most medicines. The scientific study of plants is known as botany, a branch of biology, Plants are one of the two groups into which all living things were traditionally divided, the other is animals. The division goes back at least as far as Aristotle, who distinguished between plants, which generally do not move, and animals, which often are mobile to catch their food. Much later, when Linnaeus created the basis of the system of scientific classification. Since then, it has become clear that the plant kingdom as originally defined included several unrelated groups, however, these organisms are still often considered plants, particularly in popular contexts. When the name Plantae or plant is applied to a group of organisms or taxon. The evolutionary history of plants is not yet settled. Those which have been called plants are in bold, the way in which the groups of green algae are combined and named varies considerably between authors. Algae comprise several different groups of organisms which produce energy through photosynthesis, most conspicuous among the algae are the seaweeds, multicellular algae that may roughly resemble land plants, but are classified among the brown, red and green algae. Each of these groups also includes various microscopic and single-celled organisms
5.
Flowering plant
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The flowering plants, also known as Angiospermae or Magnoliophyta, are the most diverse group of land plants, with 416 families, approx. 13,164 known genera and a total of c.295,383 known species, etymologically, angiosperm means a plant that produces seeds within an enclosure, in other words, a fruiting plant. The term angiosperm comes from the Greek composite word meaning enclosed seeds, the ancestors of flowering plants diverged from gymnosperms in the Triassic Period, during the range 245 to 202 million years ago, and the first flowering plants are known from 160 mya. They diversified extensively during the Lower Cretaceous, became widespread by 120 mya, angiosperms differ from other seed plants in several ways, described in the table. These distinguishing characteristics taken together have made the angiosperms the most diverse and numerous land plants, the amount and complexity of tissue-formation in flowering plants exceeds that of gymnosperms. The vascular bundles of the stem are arranged such that the xylem and phloem form concentric rings, in the dicotyledons, the bundles in the very young stem are arranged in an open ring, separating a central pith from an outer cortex. In each bundle, separating the xylem and phloem, is a layer of meristem or active formative tissue known as cambium, the soft phloem becomes crushed, but the hard wood persists and forms the bulk of the stem and branches of the woody perennial. Among the monocotyledons, the bundles are more numerous in the stem and are scattered through the ground tissue. They contain no cambium and once formed the stem increases in diameter only in exceptional cases, the characteristic feature of angiosperms is the flower. Flowers show remarkable variation in form and elaboration, and provide the most trustworthy external characteristics for establishing relationships among angiosperm species, the function of the flower is to ensure fertilization of the ovule and development of fruit containing seeds. The floral apparatus may arise terminally on a shoot or from the axil of a leaf, occasionally, as in violets, a flower arises singly in the axil of an ordinary foliage-leaf. There are two kinds of cells produced by flowers. Microspores, which divide to become pollen grains, are the male cells and are borne in the stamens. The female cells called megaspores, which divide to become the egg cell, are contained in the ovule. The flower may consist only of parts, as in willow. Usually, other structures are present and serve to protect the sporophylls, the individual members of these surrounding structures are known as sepals and petals. The outer series is usually green and leaf-like, and functions to protect the rest of the flower, the inner series is, in general, white or brightly colored, and is more delicate in structure. It functions to attract insect or bird pollinators, attraction is effected by color, scent, and nectar, which may be secreted in some part of the flower
6.
Eudicots
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The eudicots, Eudicotidae or eudicotyledons are a monophyletic clade of flowering plants that had been called tricolpates or non-magnoliid dicots by previous authors. The close relationships among flowering plants with tricolpate pollen grains was initially seen in studies of shared derived characters. These plants have a trait in their pollen grains of exhibiting three colpi or grooves paralleling the polar axis. Later molecular evidence confirmed the basis for the evolutionary relationships among flowering plants with tricolpate pollen grains. The term means true dicotyledons, as it contains the majority of plants that have been considered dicots and have characteristics of the dicots, the term eudicots has subsequently been widely adopted in botany to refer to one of the two largest clades of angiosperms, monocots being the other. The remaining angiosperms are sometimes referred to as basal angiosperms or paleodicots, the other name for the eudicots is tricolpates, a name which refers to the grooved structure of the pollen. Members of the group have tricolpate pollen, or forms derived from it and these pollens have three or more pores set in furrows called colpi. In contrast, most of the seed plants produce monosulcate pollen. The name tricolpates is preferred by some botanists to avoid confusion with the dicots, numerous familiar plants are eudicots, including many common food plants, trees, and ornamentals. Most leafy trees of midlatitudes also belong to eudicots, with exceptions being magnolias and tulip trees which belong to magnoliids, and Ginkgo biloba. The name eudicots is used in the APG system, of 1998 and it is applied to a clade, a monophyletic group, which includes most of the dicots. The eudicots can be divided into two groups, the basal eudicots and the core eudicots, basal eudicot is an informal name for a paraphyletic group. The core eudicots are a monophyletic group, a 2010 study suggested the core eudicots can be divided into two clades, Gunnerales and a clade called Pentapetalae, comprising all the remaining core eudicots
7.
Asterids
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In the APG IV system for the classification of flowering plants, the name asterids denotes a clade. Most of the taxa belonging to this clade had been referred to the Asteridae in the Cronquist system, the name asterids resembles the earlier botanical name but is intended to be the name of a clade rather than a formal ranked name, in the sense of the ICBN. The phylogenetic tree presented hereafter has been proposed by the APG IV project, genetic analysis carried out after APG II maintains that the sister to all other asterids are the Cornales. A second order that split from the base of the asterids are the Ericales, the remaining orders cluster into two clades, the lamiids and the campanulids. The structure of both of these clades has changed in APG III, in APG III system, the following clades were renamed, euasterids I → lamiids euasterids II → campanulids Asterids in Stevens, P. F. Angiosperm Phylogeny Website
8.
Apiales
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The Apiales are an order of flowering plants. The families are recognized in the APG III system. This is typical of the classifications, though there is some slight variation. Under this definition, well-known members include carrots, celery, parsley, the order Apiales is placed within the asterid group of eudicots as circumscribed by the APG III system. Within the asterids, Apiales belongs to a group called the campanulids. In 2010, a subclade of Apiidae named Dipsapiidae was defined to consist of the three orders, Apiales, Paracryphiales, and Dipsacales. Under the Cronquist system, only the Apiaceae and Araliaceae were included here, the Pittosporaceae were placed within the Rosales, and many of the other forms within the family Cornaceae. Pennantia was in the family Icacinaceae, in the classification system of Dahlgren the Apiaceae and Araliaceae families were placed in the order Ariales, in the superorder Araliiflorae. The present understanding of the Apiales is fairly recent and is based upon comparison of DNA sequences by phylogenetic methods, the circumscriptions of some of the families have changed. In 2009, one of the subfamilies of Araliaceae was shown to be polyphyletic
9.
Apiaceae
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Apiaceae or Umbelliferae, is a family of mostly aromatic flowering plants named after the type genus Apium and commonly known as the celery, carrot or parsley family. Most Apiaceae are annual, biennial or perennial herbs, though a minority are woody shrubs or small trees such as Bupleurum fruticosum and their leaves are of variable size and alternately arranged, or with the upper leaves becoming nearly opposite. The leaves may be petiolate or sessile, there are no stipules but the petioles are frequently sheathing and the leaves may be perfoliate. The leaf blade is usually dissected, ternate or pinnatifid, but simple and entire in some genera, commonly, their leaves emit a marked smell when crushed, aromatic to foetid, but absent in some species. The defining characteristic of family is the inflorescence, the flowers nearly always aggregated in terminal umbels. The flowers are perfect and actinomorphic but there may be zygomorphic petals at the edges of the umbel. The flowers are nearly perfectly pentamerous, with five petals, sepals, the androecium consists of five stamens, but there is often variation in the functionality of the stamens even within a single inflorescence. Some flowers are functionally staminate while others are functionally pistillate, pollination of one flower by the pollen of a different flower of the same plant is common. The gynoecium consists of two carpels fused into a single, bicarpellate pistil with an inferior ovary, stylopodia support two styles and secrete nectar, attracting pollinators like flies, mosquitoes, gnats, beetles, moths, and bees. The fruit is a schizocarp consisting of two fused carpels that separate at maturity into two mericarps, each containing a single seed. The fruits of species are dispersed by wind but others such as those of Daucus spp. are covered in bristles. The shape and details of the ornamentation of the fruits are important for identification to species. Apiaceae was first described by John Lindley in 1836, the name is derived from the type genus Apium, which was originally used by Pliny the Elder circa 50 AD for a celery-like plant. The alternative name for the family, Umbelliferae, derives from the inflorescence being generally in the form of a compound umbel, the family was one of the first to be recognized as a distinct group in Jacques Daleschamps 1586 Historia generalis plantarum. With Robert Morison’s 1672 Plantarum umbelilliferarum distribution nova it became the first group of plants for which a study was published. The family is placed within the Apiales order in the APG III classification system. It is closely related to Araliaceae and the boundaries between these families remain unclear, traditionally groups within the family have been delimited largely based on fruit morphology, and the results from this have not been congruent with the more recent molecular phylogenetic analyses. The subfamilial and tribal classification for the family is currently in a state of flux, according to the Angiosperm Phylogeny Website as of July 2014434 genera are in the family Apiaceae
10.
Binomial nomenclature
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Such a name is called a binomial name, a binomen, binominal name or a scientific name, more informally it is also called a Latin name. The first part of the name identifies the genus to which the species belongs, for example, humans belong to the genus Homo and within this genus to the species Homo sapiens. The formal introduction of system of naming species is credited to Carl Linnaeus. But Gaspard Bauhin, in as early as 1623, had introduced in his book Pinax theatri botanici many names of genera that were adopted by Linnaeus. Although the general principles underlying binomial nomenclature are common to these two codes, there are differences, both in the terminology they use and in their precise rules. Similarly, both parts are italicized when a binomial name occurs in normal text, thus the binomial name of the annual phlox is now written as Phlox drummondii. In scientific works, the authority for a name is usually given, at least when it is first mentioned. In zoology Patella vulgata Linnaeus,1758, the original name given by Linnaeus was Fringilla domestica, the parentheses indicate that the species is now considered to belong in a different genus. The ICZN does not require that the name of the person who changed the genus be given, nor the date on which the change was made, in botany Amaranthus retroflexus L. – L. is the standard abbreviation used in botany for Linnaeus. – Linnaeus first named this bluebell species Scilla italica, Rothmaler transferred it to the genus Hyacinthoides, the ICN does not require that the dates of either publication be specified. Prior to the adoption of the binomial system of naming species. Together they formed a system of polynomial nomenclature and these names had two separate functions. First, to designate or label the species, and second, to be a diagnosis or description, such polynomial names may sometimes look like binomials, but are significantly different. For example, Gerards herbal describes various kinds of spiderwort, The first is called Phalangium ramosum, Branched Spiderwort, is aptly termed Phalangium Ephemerum Virginianum, Soon-Fading Spiderwort of Virginia. The Latin phrases are short descriptions, rather than identifying labels, the Bauhins, in particular Caspar Bauhin, took some important steps towards the binomial system, by pruning the Latin descriptions, in many cases to two words. The adoption by biologists of a system of binomial nomenclature is due to Swedish botanist and physician Carl von Linné. It was in his 1753 Species Plantarum that he first began using a one-word trivial name together with a generic name in a system of binomial nomenclature. This trivial name is what is now known as an epithet or specific name
11.
Carl Linnaeus
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Carl Linnaeus, also known after his ennoblement as Carl von Linné, was a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, who formalised the modern system of naming organisms called binomial nomenclature. He is known by the father of modern taxonomy. Many of his writings were in Latin, and his name is rendered in Latin as Carolus Linnæus, Linnaeus was born in the countryside of Småland, in southern Sweden. He received most of his education at Uppsala University. He lived abroad between 1735 and 1738, where he studied and also published a first edition of his Systema Naturae in the Netherlands and he then returned to Sweden, where he became professor of medicine and botany at Uppsala. In the 1740s, he was sent on journeys through Sweden to find and classify plants. In the 1750s and 1760s, he continued to collect and classify animals, plants, and minerals, at the time of his death, he was one of the most acclaimed scientists in Europe. The philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau sent him the message, Tell him I know no man on earth. The German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote, With the exception of Shakespeare and Spinoza, Swedish author August Strindberg wrote, Linnaeus was in reality a poet who happened to become a naturalist. Among other compliments, Linnaeus has been called Princeps botanicorum, The Pliny of the North and he is also considered as one of the founders of modern ecology. In botany, the abbreviation used to indicate Linnaeus as the authority for species names is L. In older publications, sometimes the abbreviation Linn. is found, Linnæus was born in the village of Råshult in Småland, Sweden, on 23 May 1707. He was the first child of Nicolaus Ingemarsson and Christina Brodersonia and his siblings were Anna Maria Linnæa, Sofia Juliana Linnæa, Samuel Linnæus, and Emerentia Linnæa. One of a line of peasants and priests, Nils was an amateur botanist, a Lutheran minister. Christina was the daughter of the rector of Stenbrohult, Samuel Brodersonius, a year after Linnæus birth, his grandfather Samuel Brodersonius died, and his father Nils became the rector of Stenbrohult. The family moved into the rectory from the curates house, even in his early years, Linnæus seemed to have a liking for plants, flowers in particular. Whenever he was upset, he was given a flower, which calmed him. Nils spent much time in his garden and often showed flowers to Linnaeus, soon Linnæus was given his own patch of earth where he could grow plants
12.
Synonym (taxonomy)
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For example, Linnaeus was the first to give a scientific name to the Norway spruce, which he called Pinus abies. This name is no longer in use, it is now a synonym of the current scientific name which is Picea abies, unlike synonyms in other contexts, in taxonomy a synonym is not interchangeable with the name of which it is a synonym. In taxonomy, synonyms are not equals, but have a different status, for any taxon with a particular circumscription, position, and rank, only one scientific name is considered to be the correct one at any given time. A synonym cannot exist in isolation, it is always an alternative to a different scientific name, given that the correct name of a taxon depends on the taxonomic viewpoint used a name that is one taxonomists synonym may be another taxonomists correct name. Synonyms may arise whenever the same taxon is described and named more than once, independently. They may also arise when existing taxa are changed, as when two taxa are joined to one, a species is moved to a different genus. To the general user of scientific names, in such as agriculture, horticulture, ecology, general science. A synonym is a name that was used as the correct scientific name but which has been displaced by another scientific name. Thus Oxford Dictionaries Online defines the term as a name which has the same application as another. In handbooks and general texts, it is useful to have mentioned as such after the current scientific name. Synonyms used in this way may not always meet the strict definitions of the synonym in the formal rules of nomenclature which govern scientific names. Changes of scientific name have two causes, they may be taxonomic or nomenclatural, a name change may be caused by changes in the circumscription, position or rank of a taxon, representing a change in taxonomic, scientific insight. A name change may be due to purely nomenclatural reasons, that is, based on the rules of nomenclature, the earliest such name is called the senior synonym, while the later name is the junior synonym. One basic principle of zoological nomenclature is that the earliest correctly published name, synonyms are important because if the earliest name cannot be used, then the next available junior synonym must be used for the taxon. Objective synonyms refer to taxa with the type and same rank. For example, John Edward Gray published the name Antilocapra anteflexa in 1855 for a species of pronghorn, however, it is now commonly accepted that his specimen was an unusual individual of the species Antilocapra americana published by George Ord in 1815. Ords name thus takes precedence, with Antilocapra anteflexa being a subjective synonym. Objective synonyms are common at the level of genera, because for various reasons two genera may contain the type species, these are objective synonyms
13.
Mediterranean region
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As a rule of thumb, the Mediterranean Basin is the Old World region where olive trees grow. The Mediterranean basin covers portions of three continents Africa, Asia, and Europe and it has a varied and contrasting topography. Contrary to the sandy beach images portrayed in most tourist brochures. Mountains can be seen from almost anywhere, the Mediterranean Basin extends into Western Asia, covering the western and southern portions of the peninsula of Turkey, excluding the temperate-climate mountains of central Turkey. It includes the Mediterranean climate Levant at the end of the Mediterranean, bounded on the east and south by the Syrian. The northern portion of the Maghreb region of northwestern Africa has a Mediterranean climate, separated from the Sahara Desert, Europe lies to the north, and three large Southern European peninsulas, the Iberian Peninsula, Italian Peninsula, and the Balkan Peninsula, extend into the Mediterranean-climate zone. The Mediterranean Basin was shaped by the ancient collision of the northward-moving African-Arabian continent with the stable Eurasian continent, as Africa-Arabia moved north, it closed the former Tethys Sea, which formerly separated Eurasia from the ancient super continent of Gondwana, of which Africa was part. At about the time,170 mya in the Jurassic period. The collision pushed up a vast system of mountains, extending from the Pyrenees in Spain to the Zagros Mountains in Iran and this episode of mountain building, known as the Alpine orogeny, occurred mostly during the Oligocene and Miocene epochs. The Neotethys became larger during these collisions and associated folding and subduction, about 6 mya during the late Miocene, the Mediterranean was closed at its western end by drifting Africa, which caused the entire sea to evaporate. There followed several episodes of sea drawdown and re-flooding known as the Messinian Salinity Crisis, recent studies, however, show that repeated desiccation and re-flooding is unlikely from a geodynamic point of view. The end of the Miocene also marked a change in the Mediterranean Basins climate, fossil evidence shows that the Mediterranean Basin had a relatively humid subtropical climate with summer rainfall during the Miocene, which supported laurel forests. The shift to a Mediterranean climate occurred within the last 3. 2–2.8 million years, during the Pliocene epoch, much of these forests and shrublands have been altered beyond recognition by thousands of years of human habitation. There are now very few relatively intact natural areas in what was once a wooded region. The Mediterranean Region was first proposed by German botanist August Grisebach in the late 19th century, drosophyllaceae, recently segregated from Droseraceae, is the only plant family endemic to the region. Among the endemic plant genera are, The genera Aubrieta, Sesamoides, Cynara, Dracunculus, moreover, many plant taxa are shared with one of the four neighboring floristic regions only. The Mediterranean Basin is the largest of the worlds five Mediterranean forests, woodlands and it is home to a number of plant communities, which vary with rainfall, elevation, latitude, and soils. Scrublands occur in the driest areas, especially areas near the seacoast where wind, low, soft-leaved scrublands around the Mediterranean are known as garrigar in Catalan, garrigue in French, phrygana in Greek, tomillares in Spanish, and batha in Hebrew
14.
Southwest Asia
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Western Asia, West Asia, Southwestern Asia or Southwest Asia is the westernmost subregion of Asia. The concept is in limited use, as it overlaps with the Middle East. The term is used for the purposes of grouping countries in statistics. The total population of Western Asia is an estimated 300 million as of 2015, in an unrelated context, the term is also used in ancient history and archaeology to divide the Fertile Crescent into the Asiatic or Western Asian cultures as opposed to ancient Egypt. As a geographic concept, Western Asia almost always includes the Levant, Mesopotamia, the term is used pragmatically and has no correct or generally agreed-upon definition. In contrast to this definition, the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation in its 2015 yearbook also includes Armenia and Azerbaijan, unlike the UNIDO, the United Nations Statistics Division excludes Iran from Western Asia and include Turkey, Georgia, and Cyprus in the region. These four countries are listed in the European category of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, the Olympic Council of Asias multi-sport event West Asian Games are contested by athletes representing these thirteen countries. Among the regions sports organisations are the West Asia Basketball Association, West Asian Billiards and Snooker Federation, West Asian Football Federation, Western Asia was in use as a geographical term in the early 19th century, even before Near East became current as a geopolitical concept. Use of the term in the context of contemporary geopolitics or world economy appears to date from the 1960s, Western Asia is located directly south of Eastern Europe. The region is surrounded by seven major seas, the Aegean Sea, the Black Sea, the Caspian Sea, the Persian Gulf, the Arabian Sea, the Red Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea. The Dasht-e Kavir and Dasht-e Lut deserts in eastern Iran naturally delimit the region somewhat from Asia itself, three major tectonic plates converge on Western Asia, including the African, Eurasian, and Arabian plates. The boundaries between the plates make up the Azores-Gibraltar Ridge, extending across North Africa, the Red Sea. The Arabian Plate is moving northward into the Anatolian plate at the East Anatolian Fault, several major aquifers provide water to large portions of Western Asia. In Saudi Arabia, two large aquifers of Palaeozoic and Triassic origins are located beneath the Jabal Tuwayq mountains and areas west to the Red Sea. Cretaceous and Eocene-origin aquifers are located beneath large portions of central and eastern Saudi Arabia, including Wasia, flood or furrow irrigation, as well as sprinkler methods, are extensively used for irrigation, covering nearly 90,000 km² across Western Asia for agriculture. Western Asia is primarily arid and semi-arid, and can be subject to drought, the region consists of grasslands, rangelands, deserts, and mountains. Water shortages are a problem in parts of West Asia, with rapidly growing populations increasing demands for water. Major rivers, including the Tigris and Euphrates, provide sources for water to support agriculture
15.
Fennel
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Fennel is a flowering plant species in the carrot family. It is a hardy, perennial herb with flowers and feathery leaves. It is indigenous to the shores of the Mediterranean but has become naturalized in many parts of the world, especially on dry soils near the sea-coast. It is an aromatic and flavorful herb with culinary and medicinal uses and. Florence fennel or finocchio is a selection with a swollen, bulb-like stem base that is used as a vegetable, fennel is used as a food plant by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species including in its native range the mouse moth and the Old-World swallowtail. Where it has introduced in north America it may be used by the anise swallowtail. The word fennel developed from the Middle English fenel or fenyl and this came from the Old English fenol or finol, which in turn came from the Latin feniculum or foeniculum, the diminutive of fenum or faenum, meaning hay. The Latin word for the plant was ferula, which is now used as the name of a related plant. The Greek name for fennel is marathon or marathos, and the place of the battle of Marathon. The word is first attested in Mycenaean Linear B form as ma-ra-tu-wo, as Old English finule, fennel is one of the nine plants invoked in the pagan Anglo-Saxon Nine Herbs Charm, recorded in the 10th century. In the 15th century, Portuguese settlers on Madeira noticed the abundance of fennel, and used the Portuguese word funcho. Fennel, Foeniculum vulgare, is a perennial herb and it is erect, glaucous green, and grows to heights of up to 2.5 m, with hollow stems. The leaves grow up to 40 cm long, they are finely dissected, with the ultimate segments filiform, the flowers are produced in terminal compound umbels 5–15 cm wide, each umbel section having 20–50 tiny yellow flowers on short pedicels. The fruit is a dry seed from 4–10 mm long, half as wide or less, fennel is widely cultivated, both in its native range and elsewhere, for its edible, strongly flavored leaves and fruits. Its aniseed flavor comes from anethole, a compound also found in anise and star anise. Florence fennel is a group with inflated leaf bases which form a bulb-like structure. It is of cultivated origin, and has a mild anise-like flavor, Florence fennel plants are smaller than the wild type. The inflated leaf bases are eaten as a vegetable, both raw and cooked, several cultivars of Florence fennel are also known by several other names, notably the Italian name finocchio
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Liquorice
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Liquorice, or licorice, is the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra from which a sweet flavour can be extracted. The liquorice plant is a perennial legume native to southern Europe and parts of Asia. It is not botanically related to anise, star anise, or fennel, liquorice flavours are also used as candies or sweeteners, particularly in some European and Middle Eastern countries. Liquorice extracts have a number of uses, and they are also used in herbal. Excessive consumption of liquorice may result in effects, and overconsumption should be suspected clinically in patients presenting with otherwise unexplained hypokalemia. The word liquorice is derived from the Greek γλυκύρριζα, meaning root, from γλυκύς, sweet + ῥίζα, root. It is usually spelled liquorice in British usage, but licorice in the United States and it is a herbaceous perennial, growing to 1 m in height, with pinnate leaves about 7–15 cm long, with 9–17 leaflets. The flowers are 0. 8–1.2 cm long, purple to pale whitish blue, the fruit is an oblong pod, 2–3 cm long, containing several seeds. The scent of liquorice root comes from a complex and variable combination of compounds, much of the sweetness in liquorice comes from glycyrrhizin, which has a sweet taste, 30–50 times the sweetness of sugar. The sweetness is very different from sugar, being less instant, tart, the isoflavene glabrene and the isoflavane glabridin, found in the roots of liquorice, are phytoestrogens. Liquorice, which grows best in well-drained soils in valleys with full sun, is harvested in the autumn two to three years after planting. Countries producing liquorice include India, Iran, Italy, Afghanistan, the People’s Republic of China, Pakistan, Iraq, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Turkey, and England. The worlds leading manufacturer of products is M&F Worldwide, which manufactures more than 70% of the worldwide liquorice flavours sold to end users. Most liquorice is used as a agent for tobacco. American blend cigarettes made up a portion of worldwide tobacco consumption in earlier years. M&F Worldwide sold approximately 73% of its products to the tobacco industry in 2005. Liquorice provides tobacco products with a sweetness and a distinctive flavour that blends readily with the natural. It represses harshness and is not detectable as liquorice by the consumer, tobacco flavourings such as liquorice also make it easier to inhale the smoke by creating bronchodilators, which open up the lungs
17.
Old French
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Old French was the Gallo-Romance dialect continuum spoken from the 9th century to the 14th century. In the 14th century, these came to be collectively known as the langues doïl. The mid-14th century is taken as the period to Middle French. The areal of Old French in contemporary terms corresponded to the parts of the Kingdom of France, Upper Burgundy. As part of the emerging Gallo-Romance dialect continuum, the langues doïl were contrasted with the langue doc, in these examples, we notice a clear consequence of bilingualism, that sometimes even changed the first syllable of the Latin words. Pope estimated that perhaps still 15% of the vocabulary of modern French derives from Germanic sources, at the third Council of Tours in 813, priests were ordered to preach in the vernacular language, since the common people could no longer understand formal Latin. The second-oldest document in Old French is the Eulalia sequence, which is important for reconstruction of Old French pronunciation due to its consistent spelling. The Capetians langue doïl, the forerunner of modern standard French, did not begin to become the common speech of all of France, however, until after the French Revolution. In the Late Middle Ages, the Old French dialects diverged into a number of distinct langues doïl, during the Early Modern period, French now becomes established as the official language of the Kingdom of France throughout the realm, also including the langue doc-speaking territories in the south. Old French gives way to Middle French in the mid-14th century, the earliest extant French literary texts date from the ninth century, but very few texts before the 11th century have survived. The first literary works written in Old French were saints lives, the Canticle of Saint Eulalie, written in the second half of the 9th century, is generally accepted as the first such text. The first of these is the area of the chansons de geste. More than one hundred chansons de geste have survived in three hundred manuscripts. The oldest and most celebrated of the chansons de geste is The Song of Roland, a fourth grouping, not listed by Bertrand, is the Crusade cycle, dealing with the First Crusade and its immediate aftermath. Jean Bodels other two categories—the Matter of Rome and the Matter of Britain—concern the French romance or roman, around a hundred verse romances survive from the period 1150–1220. From around 1200 on, the tendency was increasingly to write the romances in prose, the most important romance of the 13th century is the Romance of the Rose which breaks considerably from the conventions of the chivalric adventure story. The Occitan or Provençal poets were called troubadours, from the word trobar to find, lyric poets in Old French are called trouvères. By the late 13th century, the tradition in France had begun to develop in ways that differed significantly from the troubadour poets
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Dill
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Dill is an annual herb in the celery family Apiaceae. It is the species in the genus Anethum. Dill is widely grown in Eurasia where its leaves and seeds are used as a herb or spice for flavouring food, dill grows up to 40–60 cm, with slender hollow stems and alternate, finely divided, softly delicate leaves 10–20 cm long. The ultimate leaf divisions are 1–2 mm broad, slightly broader than the leaves of fennel, which are threadlike, less than 1 mm broad. The flowers are white to yellow, in small umbels 2–9 cm diameter, the seeds are 4–5 mm long and 1 mm thick, and straight to slightly curved with a longitudinally ridged surface. Dill is a Germanic word whose origin is unknown, fresh and dried dill leaves are widely used as herbs in Europe and central Asia. Like caraway, the leaves of dill are aromatic and are used to flavor many foods such as gravlax and other fish dishes, borscht and other soups. Dill is best when used fresh as it loses its flavor rapidly if dried, however, dill seed, having a flavor similar to caraway but also resembling that of fresh or dried dill weed, is used as a spice. Dill oil is extracted from the leaves, stems and seeds of the plant, the oil from the seeds is distilled and used in the manufacturing of soaps. Dill is the ingredient in dill pickles, cucumbers preserved in salty brine and/or vinegar. In central and eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Baltic states, Russia and Finland and it is also popular in summer to drink fermented milk mixed with dill. In the same way, prepared dill is used as a topping for boiled potatoes covered with fresh butter – especially in summer there are so-called new, or young. The dill leaves can be mixed with butter, making a dill butter, dill leaves mixed with tvorog form one of the traditional cheese spreads used for sandwiches. Fresh dill leaves are used all round as an ingredient in salads, e. g. one made of lettuce, fresh cucumbers and tomatoes. In Poland, fresh dill leaves mixed with sour cream are the basis for dressings and it is especially popular to use this kind of sauce with freshly cut cucumbers, which practically are wholly immersed in the sauce, making a salad called mizeria. The dill leaves serve as a basis for cooking dill sauce, used hot for baked freshwater fish and for chicken or turkey breast, in Poland it is popular to cook a dill-based soup, served with potatoes and hard-boiled eggs. Whole stems including roots and flower buds are used to prepare Polish-style pickled cucumbers. Whole stems of dill are also cooked with potatoes, especially the potatoes of autumn and winter, some kinds of fish, especially trout and salmon, are traditionally baked with the stems and leaves of dill
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Optical microscope
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The optical microscope, often referred to as light microscope, is a type of microscope which uses visible light and a system of lenses to magnify images of small samples. Optical microscopes are the oldest design of microscope and were invented in their present compound form in the 17th century. Basic optical microscopes can be simple, although there are many complex designs which aim to improve resolution. The image from a microscope can be captured by normal light-sensitive cameras to generate a micrograph. Originally images were captured by photographic film but modern developments in CMOS, purely digital microscopes are now available which use a CCD camera to examine a sample, showing the resulting image directly on a computer screen without the need for eyepieces. Alternatives to optical microscopy which do not use visible light include scanning electron microscopy, there are two basic types of optical microscopes, simple microscopes and compound microscopes. A simple microscope is one which uses a lens for magnification. A compound microscope uses several lenses to enhance the magnification of an object, the vast majority of modern research microscopes are compound microscopes while some cheaper commercial digital microscopes are simple single lens microscopes. Compound microscopes can be divided into a variety of other types of microscopes which differ in their optical configurations, cost. A simple microscope uses a lens or set of lenses to enlarge an object through angular magnification alone, the use of a single convex lens or groups of lenses are still found in simple magnification devices such as the magnifying glass, loupes, and eyepieces for telescopes and microscopes. A compound microscope uses a close to the object being viewed to collect light which focuses a real image of the object inside the microscope. That image is magnified by a second lens or group of lenses that gives the viewer an enlarged inverted virtual image of the object. The use of a compound objective/eyepiece combination allows for higher magnification. Common compound microscopes often feature exchangeable objective lenses, allowing the user to quickly adjust the magnification, a compound microscope also enables more advanced illumination setups, such as phase contrast. There are many variants of the optical microscope design for specialized purposes. Comparison microscope, which has two light paths allowing direct comparison of two samples via one image in each eye. Inverted microscope, for studying samples from below, useful for cell cultures in liquid, student microscope, designed for low cost, durability, and ease of use. Polarizing microscope, similar to the petrographic microscope, phase contrast microscope, which applies the phase contrast illumination method
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Herbaceous plant
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Herbaceous plants are plants that have no persistent woody stem above ground. Herbaceous plants may be annuals, biennials or perennials, annual herbaceous plants die completely at the end of the growing season or when they have flowered and fruited, and they then grow again from seed. Herbaceous perennial and biennial plants may have stems that die at the end of the growing season, but parts of the plant survive under or close to the ground from season to season. New growth develops from living tissues remaining on or under the ground, including roots, examples of herbaceous biennials include carrot, parsnip and common ragwort, herbaceous perennials include potato, peony, hosta, mint, most ferns and most grasses. Some relatively fast-growing herbaceous plants are pioneers, or early-successional species, others form the main vegetation of many stable habitats, occurring for example in the ground layer of forests, or in naturally open habitats such as meadow, salt marsh or desert. Some herbaceous plants can grow large, such as the Musa genus. The age of some herbaceous plants can be determined by analyzing annual growth rings in the secondary root xylem
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Annual plant
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An annual plant is a plant that completes its life cycle, from germination to the production of seed, within one year, and then dies. Summer annuals germinate during spring or early summer and mature by autumn of the same year, winter annuals germinate during the autumn and mature during the spring or summer of the following calendar year. One seed-to-seed life cycle for an annual can occur in as little as a month in some species, oilseed rapa can go from seed-to-seed in about five weeks under a bank of fluorescent lamps. This style of growing is used in classrooms for education. Many desert annuals are therophytes, because their life cycle is only weeks. In cultivation, many plants are, or are grown as, annuals. Some perennials and biennials are grown in gardens as annuals for convenience, carrot, celery and parsley are true biennials that are usually grown as annual crops for their edible roots, petioles and leaves, respectively. Tomato, sweet potato and bell pepper are tender perennials usually grown as annuals, ornamental perennials commonly grown as annuals are impatiens, wax begonia, snapdragon, Pelargonium, coleus and petunia. Examples of true annuals include corn, wheat, rice, lettuce, peas, watermelon, beans, zinnia, summer annuals sprout, flower, produce seed, and die, during the warmer months of the year. The lawn weed crabgrass is a summer annual, winter annuals germinate in autumn or winter, live through the winter, then bloom in winter or spring. The plants grow and bloom during the season when most other plants are dormant or other annuals are in seed form waiting for warmer weather to germinate. Winter annuals die after flowering and setting seed, the seeds germinate in the autumn or winter when the soil temperature is cool. Winter annuals typically grow low to the ground, where they are sheltered from the coldest nights by snow cover. Some common winter annuals include henbit, deadnettle, chickweed, ironically, the property that they prevent the soil from drying out can also be problematic for commercial agriculture. In 2008, it was discovered that the inactivation of only two genes in one species of annual plant leads to the conversion into a perennial plant, researchers deactivated the SOC1 and FUL genes in Arabidopsis thaliana, which control flowering time. This switch established phenotypes common in plants, such as wood formation
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Leaf
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A leaf is an organ of a vascular plant and is the principal lateral appendage of the stem. The leaves and stem together form the shoot, Leaves are collectively referred to as foliage, as in autumn foliage. Although leaves can be seen in different shapes, sizes and textures, typically a leaf is a thin, dorsiventrally flattened organ, borne above ground. Most leaves have distinctive upper surface and lower surface that differ in colour, hairiness, broad, flat leaves with complex venation are known as megaphylls and the species that bear them, the majority, as broad-leaved or megaphyllous plants. In others, such as the clubmosses, with different evolutionary origins, some leaves, such as bulb scales are not above ground, and in many aquatic species the leaves are submerged in water. Succulent plants often have thick juicy leaves, but some leaves are without major photosynthetic function and may be dead at maturity, as in some cataphylls, furthermore, several kinds of leaf-like structures found in vascular plants are not totally homologous with them. Examples include flattened plant stems called phylloclades and cladodes, and flattened leaf stems called phyllodes which differ from both in their structure and origin. Many structures of plants, such as the phyllids of mosses and liverworts and even of some foliose lichens. Leaves are the most important organs of most vascular plants and these are then further processed by chemical synthesis into more complex organic molecules such as cellulose, the basic structural material in plant cell walls. The plant must therefore bring these three together in the leaf for photosynthesis to take place. Once sugar has been synthesized, it needs to be transported to areas of growth such as the plant shoots and roots. Vascular plants transport sucrose in a tissue called the phloem. The phloem and xylem are parallel to each other but the transport of materials is usually in opposite directions. Within the leaf these vascular systems branch to form veins which supply as much as the leaf as possible and they are arranged on the plant so as to expose their surfaces to light as efficiently as possible without shading each other, but there are many exceptions and complications. For instance plants adapted to windy conditions may have pendent leaves, such as in many willows, the flat, or laminar, shape also maximises thermal contact with the surrounding air, promoting cooling. Functionally, in addition to photosynthesis the leaf is the site of transpiration and guttation. Many gymnosperms have thin needle-like or scale-like leaves that can be advantageous in cold climates with frequent snow and these are interpreted as reduced from megaphyllous leaves of their Devonian ancestors. For xerophytes the major constraint is not light flux or intensity, some window plants such as Fenestraria species and some Haworthia species such as Haworthia tesselata and Haworthia truncata are examples of xerophytes. and Bulbine mesembryanthemoides
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Pinnation
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Pinnation is the arrangement of feather-like or multi-divided features arising from both sides of a common axis. Pinnation occurs in biological morphology, in crystals, such as forms of ice or metal crystals. The term derives from the Latin word pinna meaning feather, wing, a similar concept is pectination, which is a comb-like arrangement of parts. Pinnation is commonly referred to in contrast to palmation, in which the parts or structures radiate out from a common point. The terms pinnation and pennation are cognate, and although they are used distinctly. Botanically, pinnation is an arrangement of structures arising at multiple points along a common axis. For example, once-divided leaf blades having leaflets arranged on both sides of a rachis are pinnately compound leaves, many palms and most cycads and grevilleas have pinnately divided leaves. Most species of ferns have pinnate or more highly divided fronds, plants with pinnate leaves are sometimes colloquially called feather-leaved. Pinnatisect, cut all the way to the midrib or other axis, pinnate-pinnatifid, pinnate, with the pinnae being pinnatifid. Paripinnate, pinnately compound leaves in which leaflets are born in pairs along the rachis without a terminal leaflet. Imparipinnate, pinnately compound leaves in which there is a terminal leaflet rather than a terminal pair of leaflets. Bipinnate, pinnately compound leaves in which the leaflets are themselves pinnately compound, tripinnate, pinnately compound leaves in which the leaflets are themselves bipinnate, also called thrice-pinnate. Tetrapinnate, pinnately compound leaves in which the leaflets are themselves tripinnate, unipinnate, solitary compound leaf with a row of leaflets arranged along each side of a common rachis. The term pinnula is the Latin diminutive of pinna, either as such or in the Anglicised form, pinnule, some apply it to the leaflets of a pinna, especially the leaflets of bipinnate or tripinnate leaves. Others also or alternatively apply it second or third divisions of a bipinnate or tripinnate leaf. It is the ultimate division of a compound leaf, or a pinnate subdivision of a multipinnate leaf. Pinnation occurs in certain systems in which all major tributary streams enter the main channels by flowing in one direction at an oblique angle
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Leaflet (botany)
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A leaflet in botany is a leaf-like part of a compound leaf. Though it resembles a leaf, a leaflet is not borne on a main plant stem or branch, as a leaf is. Compound leaves are common in many plant families and they differ widely in morphology, the two main classes of compound leaf morphology are palmate and pinnate. For example, a plant has palmate compound leaves, whereas some species of Acacia have pinnate leaves. The ultimate free division of a leaf, or a pinnate subdivision of a multipinnate leaf is called a pinnule or pinnula
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Flower
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A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in plants that are floral. The biological function of a flower is to effect reproduction, usually by providing a mechanism for the union of sperm with eggs, Flowers may facilitate outcrossing or allow selfing. Some flowers produce diaspores without fertilization, Flowers contain sporangia and are the site where gametophytes develop. Many flowers have evolved to be attractive to animals, so as to them to be vectors for the transfer of pollen. After fertilization, the ovary of the flower develops into fruit containing seeds, the essential parts of a flower can be considered in two parts, the vegetative part, consisting of petals and associated structures in the perianth, and the reproductive or sexual parts. A stereotypical flower consists of four kinds of structures attached to the tip of a short stalk, each of these kinds of parts is arranged in a whorl on the receptacle. The four main whorls are as follows, Collectively the calyx, corolla, the next whorl toward the apex, composed of units called petals, which are typically thin, soft and colored to attract animals that help the process of pollination. Androecium, the whorl, consisting of units called stamens. Stamens consist of two parts, a called a filament, topped by an anther where pollen is produced by meiosis. Gynoecium, the innermost whorl of a flower, consisting of one or more units called carpels, the carpel or multiple fused carpels form a hollow structure called an ovary, which produces ovules internally. Ovules are megasporangia and they in turn produce megaspores by meiosis which develop into female gametophytes and these give rise to egg cells. The gynoecium of a flower is described using an alternative terminology wherein the structure one sees in the innermost whorl is called a pistil. A pistil may consist of a carpel or a number of carpels fused together. The sticky tip of the pistil, the stigma, is the receptor of pollen, the supportive stalk, the style, becomes the pathway for pollen tubes to grow from pollen grains adhering to the stigma. The relationship to the gynoecium on the receptacle is described as hypogynous, perigynous, although the arrangement described above is considered typical, plant species show a wide variation in floral structure. These modifications have significance in the evolution of flowering plants and are used extensively by botanists to establish relationships among plant species, the four main parts of a flower are generally defined by their positions on the receptacle and not by their function. Many flowers lack some parts or parts may be modified into other functions and/or look like what is typically another part, in some families, like Ranunculaceae, the petals are greatly reduced and in many species the sepals are colorful and petal-like. Other flowers have modified stamens that are petal-like, the flowers of Peonies and Roses are mostly petaloid stamens
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Fruit
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In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants formed from the ovary after flowering. Fruits are the means by which angiosperms disseminate seeds, accordingly, fruits account for a substantial fraction of the worlds agricultural output, and some have acquired extensive cultural and symbolic meanings. On the other hand, in usage, fruit includes many structures that are not commonly called fruits, such as bean pods, corn kernels, tomatoes. The section of a fungus that produces spores is called a fruiting body. Many common terms for seeds and fruit do not correspond to the botanical classifications, however, in botany, a fruit is the ripened ovary or carpel that contains seeds, a nut is a type of fruit and not a seed, and a seed is a ripened ovule. Examples of culinary vegetables and nuts that are botanically fruit include corn, cucurbits, eggplant, legumes, sweet pepper, in addition, some spices, such as allspice and chili pepper, are fruits, botanically speaking. g. Botanically, a grain, such as corn, rice, or wheat, is also a kind of fruit. However, the wall is very thin and is fused to the seed coat. The outer, often edible layer, is the pericarp, formed from the ovary and surrounding the seeds, the pericarp may be described in three layers from outer to inner, the epicarp, mesocarp and endocarp. Fruit that bears a prominent pointed terminal projection is said to be beaked, a fruit results from maturation of one or more flowers, and the gynoecium of the flower forms all or part of the fruit. Inside the ovary/ovaries are one or more ovules where the megagametophyte contains the egg cell, after double fertilization, these ovules will become seeds. The ovules are fertilized in a process starts with pollination. After pollination, a tube grows from the pollen through the stigma into the ovary to the ovule, later the zygote will give rise to the embryo of the seed, and the endosperm mother cell will give rise to endosperm, a nutritive tissue used by the embryo. As the ovules develop into seeds, the ovary begins to ripen and the ovary wall, in some multiseeded fruits, the extent to which the flesh develops is proportional to the number of fertilized ovules. The pericarp is often differentiated into two or three distinct layers called the exocarp, mesocarp, and endocarp, in some fruits, especially simple fruits derived from an inferior ovary, other parts of the flower, fuse with the ovary and ripen with it. In other cases, the sepals, petals and/or stamens and style of the fall off. When such other floral parts are a significant part of the fruit, it is called an accessory fruit, since other parts of the flower may contribute to the structure of the fruit, it is important to study flower structure to understand how a particular fruit forms. There are three modes of fruit development, Apocarpous fruits develop from a single flower having one or more separate carpels
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Schizocarp
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A schizocarp /ˈskɪzəkɑːrp/ is a dry fruit that, when mature, splits up into mericarps. There are different definitions, Any dry fruit composed of carpels that separate. This is similar to what happens with a capsule, but with an extra stage, Any fruit that separates into indehiscent one-seeded segments, such as a loment, Malva, Malvastrum, and Sida. Waynes Word, Schizocarps of Filaree and Cheeseweed
28.
Larva
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A larva is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a phase of their life cycle. The larvas appearance is very different from the adult form. A larva often has unique structures and organs that do not occur in the adult form and their diet may also be considerably different. Larvae are frequently adapted to separate from adults. For example, some such as tadpoles live almost exclusively in aquatic environments. By living in an environment, larvae may be given shelter from predators. Animals in the stage will consume food to fuel their transition into the adult form. In some species like barnacles, adults are immobile but their larvae are mobile, some larvae are dependent on adults to feed them. In many eusocial Hymenoptera species, the larvae are fed by female workers, in Ropalidia marginata the males are also capable of feeding larvae but they are much less efficient, spending more time and getting less food to the larvae. The larvae of species can become pubescent and do not develop further into the adult form. This is a type of neoteny and it is a misunderstanding that the larval form always reflects the groups evolutionary history. This could be the case, but often the stage has evolved secondarily. In these cases the form may differ more than the adult form from the groups common origin. Within Insects, only Endopterygotes show different types of larvae, several classifications have been suggested by many entomologists, and following classification is based on Antonio Berlese classification in 1913. There are four types of endopterygote larvae types, Apodous larvae - no legs at all and are poorly sclerotized. Based on sclerotization, three forms are recognized. Eucephalous - with well sclerotized head capsule, found in Nematocera, Buprestidae and Cerambycidae families
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Lepidoptera
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The Lepidoptera is an order of insects that includes moths and butterflies. 180,000 species of Lepidoptera are described, in 126 families and 46 superfamilies and it is one of the most widespread and widely recognizable insect orders in the world. The term was coined by Linnaeus in 1735 and is derived from Ancient Greek λεπίδος, the Lepidoptera show many variations of the basic body structure that have evolved to gain advantages in lifestyle and distribution. Recent estimates suggest the order may have more species than earlier thought, and is among the four most speciose orders, along with the Hymenoptera, Diptera, and Coleoptera. Lepidopteran species are characterized by more than three derived features, some of the most apparent being the scales covering their bodies and wings, the scales are modified, flattened hairs, and give butterflies and moths their extraordinary variety of colors and patterns. Almost all species have some form of wings, except for a few that have reduced wings or are wingless. Like most other insects, butterflies and moths are holometabolous, meaning they undergo complete metamorphosis, mating and the laying of eggs are carried out by adults, normally near or on host plants for the larvae. As they grow, these change in appearance, going through a series of stages called instars. Once fully matured, the larva develops into a pupa A few butterflies and many species spin a silk case or cocoon prior to pupating, while others do not. A butterfly pupa, called a chrysalis, has a hard skin, once the pupa has completed its metamorphosis, a sexually mature adult emerges. Accordingly, this is the most recognized and popular of insect orders with many involved in the observation, study, collection, rearing of. A person who collects or studies this order is referred to as a lepidopterist, in many species, the female may produce from 200 to 600 eggs, while in others, the number may approach 30,000 eggs in one day. The caterpillars hatching from eggs can cause damage to large quantities of crops. Many moth and butterfly species are of economic interest by virtue of their role as pollinators, the word Lepidoptera comes from the Latin word for scaly wing, from the Ancient Greek λεπίς meaning scale and πτερόν meaning wing. The origins of the common names butterfly and moth are varied, the English word butterfly is from Old English buttorfleoge, with many variations in spelling. Other than that, the origin is unknown, although it could be derived from the yellow color of many species wings suggesting the color of butter. The species of Heterocera are commonly called moths, the origins of the English word moth are more clear, deriving from the Old English moððe from Common Germanic. The Lepidoptera are among the most successful groups of insects, among the most northern dwelling species of butterflies and moths is the Arctic Apollo, which is found in the Arctic Circle in northeastern Yakutia, at an altitude of 1500 m above sea level
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Butterfly
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Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, the group comprises the large superfamily Papilionoidea, which contains at least one former group, the skippers and the most recent analyses suggest it also contains the moth-butterflies. Butterfly fossils date to the Paleocene, which was about 56 million years ago, Butterflies have the typical four-stage insect life cycle. Winged adults lay eggs on the plant on which their larvae, known as caterpillars. The caterpillars grow, sometimes rapidly, and when fully developed. When metamorphosis is complete, the skin splits, the adult insect climbs out. Butterflies are often polymorphic, and many species use of camouflage, mimicry. Some, like the monarch and the lady, migrate over long distances. Many butterflies are attacked by parasites or parasitoids, including wasps, protozoans, flies, some species are pests because in their larval stages they can damage domestic crops or trees, other species are agents of pollination of some plants. Larvae of a few butterflies eat harmful insects, and a few are predators of ants, culturally, butterflies are a popular motif in the visual and literary arts. The Oxford English Dictionary derives the word straightforwardly from Old English butorflēoge, butter-fly, similar names in Old Dutch, the earliest Lepidoptera fossils are of a small moth, Archaeolepis mane, of Jurassic age, around 190 million years ago. Butterflies evolved from moths, so while the butterflies are monophyletic, the oldest butterflies are from the Palaeocene MoClay or Fur Formation of Denmark. The oldest American butterfly is the Late Eocene Prodryas persephone from the Florissant Fossil Beds, traditionally, the butterflies have been divided into the superfamily Papilionoidea excluding the smaller groups of the Hesperiidae and the more moth-like Hedylidae of America. Butterfly adults are characterized by their four scale-covered wings, which give the Lepidoptera their name, as in all insects, the body is divided into three sections, the head, thorax, and abdomen. The thorax is composed of three segments, each with a pair of legs, in most families of butterfly the antennae are clubbed, unlike those of moths which may be threadlike or feathery. The long proboscis can be coiled when not in use for sipping nectar from flowers, some day-flying moths, such as the hummingbird hawk-moth, are exceptions to these rules. Butterfly larvae, caterpillars, have a head with strong mandibles used for cutting their food. They have cylindrical bodies, with ten segments to the abdomen, generally with short prolegs on segments 3–6 and 10, many are well camouflaged, others are aposematic with bright colours and bristly projections containing toxic chemicals obtained from their food plants
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Moth
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Moths comprise a group of insects related to butterflies, belonging to the order Lepidoptera. Most lepidopterans are moths, and there are thought to be approximately 160,000 species of moth, most species of moth are nocturnal, but there are also crepuscular and diurnal species. While the butterflies form a group, the moths, comprising the rest of the Lepidoptera. Moth antennae can be varied in appearance, but in particular lack the club end. The divisions are named by this principle, club-antennae or varied-antennae, the modern English word moth comes from Old English moððe from Common Germanic. Moth larvae, or caterpillars, make cocoons from which emerge as fully grown moths with wings. Some moth caterpillars dig holes in the ground, where they live until they are ready to turn into adult moths, moths evolved long before butterflies, fossils having been found that may be 190 million years old. Both types of lepidoptera are thought to have evolved along with flowering plants, mainly because most modern species feed on flowering plants, one of the earliest species thought to be a moth-ancestor is Archaeolepis mane, whose fossil fragments show scaled wings similar to caddisflies in their veining. Some moths, particularly their caterpillars, can be agricultural pests in many parts of the world. Examples include corn borers and bollworms, the caterpillar of the gypsy moth causes severe damage to forests in the northeastern United States, where it is an invasive species. In temperate climates, the codling moth causes extensive damage, especially to fruit farms, in tropical and subtropical climates, the diamondback moth is perhaps the most serious pest of brassicaceous crops. Several moths in the family Tineidae are commonly regarded as pests because their larvae eat fabric such as clothes and they are less likely to eat mixed materials containing some artificial fibers. There are some reports that they may be repelled by the scent of wood from juniper and cedar, by lavender, or by natural oils, however. Naphthalene is considered effective, but there are concerns over its effects on human health. Moth larvae may be killed by freezing the items which they infest for several days at a temperature below −8 °C, despite being notorious for eating clothing, most moth adults do not eat at all. Many, like the Luna, Polyphemus, Atlas, Promethea, cecropia, among those adult moths that do eat, they will drink nectar. Some moths are farmed for their economic value, the most notable of these is the silkworm, the larva of the domesticated moth Bombyx mori. It is farmed for the silk with which it builds its cocoon, as of 2002, the silk industry produces more than 130 million kilograms of raw silk, worth about 250 million U. S. dollars, each year
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Lime-speck pug
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The lime-speck pug is a moth of the family Geometridae. It is a species throughout the Palearctic region, the Near East. This is a species, all the wings being largely white except for a black blotch on the costa of the forewing. Often two broods are produced each year and the adults can be seen at any time during the summer, the species flies at night and is attracted to light and nectar-rich flowers. The larva is variable but is usually green or yellow. It feeds on the flowers of a variety of plants, the species overwinters as a pupa. Collins Guide to the Insects of Britain and Western Europe Skinner, colour Identification Guide to Moths of the British Isles
33.
Wormwood pug
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The wormwood pug is a moth of the family Geometridae. It is a species across the Palearctic region and the Near East. The wingspan is 21–23 mm and the forewings are brown with two black spots along the costa with a black discal spot completing a distinctive triangle. There is a pale line near the fringe with a distinct whitish spot near the tornus. The species flies at night in June and July and is attracted to light, as the name suggests, the larva feeds on the flowers of mugwort, but it will also feed on the flowers of a range of other plants. The species overwinters as a pupa. Collins Guide to the Insects of Britain and Western Europe Skinner, colour Identification Guide to Moths of the British Isles Wormwood pug up UKmoths Fauna Europaea Lepiforum. de
34.
Egypt
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Egypt, officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia by a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. Egypt is a Mediterranean country bordered by the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Gulf of Aqaba to the east, the Red Sea to the east and south, Sudan to the south, and Libya to the west. Across the Gulf of Aqaba lies Jordan, and across from the Sinai Peninsula lies Saudi Arabia, although Jordan and it is the worlds only contiguous Afrasian nation. Egypt has among the longest histories of any country, emerging as one of the worlds first nation states in the tenth millennium BC. Considered a cradle of civilisation, Ancient Egypt experienced some of the earliest developments of writing, agriculture, urbanisation, organised religion and central government. One of the earliest centres of Christianity, Egypt was Islamised in the century and remains a predominantly Muslim country. With over 92 million inhabitants, Egypt is the most populous country in North Africa and the Arab world, the third-most populous in Africa, and the fifteenth-most populous in the world. The great majority of its people live near the banks of the Nile River, an area of about 40,000 square kilometres, the large regions of the Sahara desert, which constitute most of Egypts territory, are sparsely inhabited. About half of Egypts residents live in areas, with most spread across the densely populated centres of greater Cairo, Alexandria. Modern Egypt is considered to be a regional and middle power, with significant cultural, political, and military influence in North Africa, the Middle East and the Muslim world. Egypts economy is one of the largest and most diversified in the Middle East, Egypt is a member of the United Nations, Non-Aligned Movement, Arab League, African Union, and Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. Miṣr is the Classical Quranic Arabic and modern name of Egypt. The name is of Semitic origin, directly cognate with other Semitic words for Egypt such as the Hebrew מִצְרַיִם, the oldest attestation of this name for Egypt is the Akkadian
35.
Middle East
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The Middle East is a transcontinental region centered on Western Asia and Egypt. The corresponding adjective is Middle-Eastern and the noun is Middle-Easterner. The term has come into usage as a replacement of the term Near East beginning in the early 20th century. Arabs, Turks, Persians, Kurds, and Azeris constitute the largest ethnic groups in the region by population. Indigenous minorities of the Middle East include Jews, Assyrians and other Arameans, Baloch, Berbers, Copts, Druze, Lurs, Mandaeans, Samaritans, Shabaks, Tats, in the Middle East, there is also a Romani community. European ethnic groups form a diaspora in the region include Albanians, Bosniaks, Circassians, Crimean Tatars, Franco-Levantines. Among other migrant populations are Bengalis as well as other Indians, Chinese, Filipinos, Indonesians, Pakistanis, the history of the Middle East dates back to ancient times, with the importance of the region being recognized for millennia. Most of the countries border the Persian Gulf have vast reserves of crude oil. The term Middle East may have originated in the 1850s in the British India Office, however, it became more widely known when American naval strategist Alfred Thayer Mahan used the term in 1902 to designate the area between Arabia and India. During this time the British and Russian Empires were vying for influence in Central Asia, Mahan realized not only the strategic importance of the region, but also of its center, the Persian Gulf. Mahan first used the term in his article The Persian Gulf and International Relations, published in September 1902 in the National Review, a British journal. The Middle East, if I may adopt a term which I have not seen, will some day need its Malta, as well as its Gibraltar, it does not follow that either will be in the Persian Gulf. The British Navy should have the facility to concentrate in force if occasion arise, about Aden, India, mahans article was reprinted in The Times and followed in October by a 20-article series entitled The Middle Eastern Question, written by Sir Ignatius Valentine Chirol. During this series, Sir Ignatius expanded the definition of Middle East to include regions of Asia which extend to the borders of India or command the approaches to India. After the series ended in 1903, The Times removed quotation marks from subsequent uses of the term, in the late 1930s, the British established the Middle East Command, which was based in Cairo, for its military forces in the region. After that time, the term Middle East gained broader usage in Europe, the description Middle has also led to some confusion over changing definitions. Before the First World War, Near East was used in English to refer to the Balkans and the Ottoman Empire, while Middle East referred to Iran, the Caucasus, Afghanistan, Central Asia, and Turkestan. The first official use of the term Middle East by the United States government was in the 1957 Eisenhower Doctrine, the Associated Press Stylebook says that Near East formerly referred to the farther west countries while Middle East referred to the eastern ones, but that now they are synonymous
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Europe
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Europe is a continent that comprises the westernmost part of Eurasia. Europe is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, yet the non-oceanic borders of Europe—a concept dating back to classical antiquity—are arbitrary. Europe covers about 10,180,000 square kilometres, or 2% of the Earths surface, politically, Europe is divided into about fifty sovereign states of which the Russian Federation is the largest and most populous, spanning 39% of the continent and comprising 15% of its population. Europe had a population of about 740 million as of 2015. Further from the sea, seasonal differences are more noticeable than close to the coast, Europe, in particular ancient Greece, was the birthplace of Western civilization. The fall of the Western Roman Empire, during the period, marked the end of ancient history. Renaissance humanism, exploration, art, and science led to the modern era, from the Age of Discovery onwards, Europe played a predominant role in global affairs. Between the 16th and 20th centuries, European powers controlled at times the Americas, most of Africa, Oceania. The Industrial Revolution, which began in Great Britain at the end of the 18th century, gave rise to economic, cultural, and social change in Western Europe. During the Cold War, Europe was divided along the Iron Curtain between NATO in the west and the Warsaw Pact in the east, until the revolutions of 1989 and fall of the Berlin Wall. In 1955, the Council of Europe was formed following a speech by Sir Winston Churchill and it includes all states except for Belarus, Kazakhstan and Vatican City. Further European integration by some states led to the formation of the European Union, the EU originated in Western Europe but has been expanding eastward since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. The European Anthem is Ode to Joy and states celebrate peace, in classical Greek mythology, Europa is the name of either a Phoenician princess or of a queen of Crete. The name contains the elements εὐρύς, wide, broad and ὤψ eye, broad has been an epithet of Earth herself in the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European religion and the poetry devoted to it. For the second part also the divine attributes of grey-eyed Athena or ox-eyed Hera. The same naming motive according to cartographic convention appears in Greek Ανατολή, Martin Litchfield West stated that phonologically, the match between Europas name and any form of the Semitic word is very poor. Next to these there is also a Proto-Indo-European root *h1regʷos, meaning darkness. Most major world languages use words derived from Eurṓpē or Europa to refer to the continent, in some Turkic languages the originally Persian name Frangistan is used casually in referring to much of Europe, besides official names such as Avrupa or Evropa
37.
Taproot
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A taproot is a large, central, and dominant root from which other roots sprout laterally. Typically a taproot is somewhat straight and very thick, is tapering in shape, dicots, one of the two divisions of angiosperms, start with a taproot, which is one main root forming from the enlarging radicle of the seed. The tap root can be persistent throughout the life of the plant but is most often replaced later in the development by a fibrous root system. A persistent taproot system forms when the radicle keeps growing and smaller lateral roots form along the taproot. The shape of taproots can vary but the typical shapes include, Conical root, fusiform root, this root is widest in the middle and tapers towards the top and the bottom, e. g. radish. Napiform root, the root has a top-like appearance and it is very broad at the top and tapers suddenly like a tail at the bottom, e. g. turnip. Many taproots are modified into storage organs and it branches off to secondary roots, which in turn branch to form tertiary roots. These may further branch to form rootlets, for most plants species the radicle dies some time after seed germination, causing the development of a fibrous root system, which lacks a main downward-growing root. A typical mature tree 30–50 m tall has a system that extends horizontally in all directions as far as the tree is tall or more. Increases photosynthesis and the evaporation of water, by 40 percent in the dry season. During the wet season, these plants can store as much as 10 percent of the precipitation as deep as 13 meters underground. Tree roots acting like pipes to water to shift around much faster than it could otherwise percolate through the soil
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Essential oil
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Not to be confused with Essential fatty acid An essential oil is a concentrated hydrophobic liquid containing volatile aroma compounds from plants. Essential oils are known as volatile oils, ethereal oils, aetherolea, or simply as the oil of the plant from which they were extracted. An oil is essential in the sense that it contains the essence of the plants fragrance—the characteristic fragrance of the plant from which it is derived, Essential oils are generally extracted by distillation, often by using steam. Other processes include expression, solvent extraction, absolute oil extraction, resin tapping and they are used in perfumes, cosmetics, soaps and other products, for flavoring food and drink, and for adding scents to incense and household cleaning products. Essential oils have been used throughout history. The earliest recorded mention of the techniques and methods used to produce essential oils is believed to be that of Ibn al-Baitar, rather than refer to essential oils themselves, modern works typically discuss specific chemical compounds of which the essential oils are composed. For example, methyl salicylate rather than oil of wintergreen, interest in essential oils has revived in recent decades with the popularity of aromatherapy, a branch of alternative medicine that uses essential oils and other aromatic compounds. Oils are volatilized, diluted in an oil and used in massage, diffused in the air by a nebulizer, heated over a candle flame. Claims for the efficacy of treatments, and treatment of cancers in particular, are now subject to regulation in most countries. Most common essential oils such as lavender, peppermint, tea oil, patchouli. Raw plant material, consisting of the flowers, leaves, wood, bark, roots, seeds, as the water is heated, the steam passes through the plant material, vaporizing the volatile compounds. The vapors flow through a coil, where they condense back to liquid, most oils are distilled in a single process. One exception is ylang-ylang which is purifed through a fractional distillation, the recondensed water is referred to as a hydrosol, hydrolat, herbal distillate, or plant water essence, which may be sold as another fragrant product. Popular hydrosols include rose water, lavender water, lemon balm, clary sage, the use of herbal distillates in cosmetics is increasing. Some plant hydrosols have unpleasant smells and are not sold. Most citrus peel oils are expressed mechanically or cold-pressed, due to the relatively large quantities of oil in citrus peel and low cost to grow and harvest the raw materials, citrus-fruit oils are cheaper than most other essential oils. Lemon or sweet orange oils are obtained as byproducts of the citrus industry, before the discovery of distillation, all essential oils were extracted by pressing. Most flowers contain too little oil to undergo expression, but their chemical components are too delicate
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Anethole
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Anethole is an organic compound that is widely used as a flavoring substance. It is a derivative of phenylpropene, a type of compound that occurs widely in nature. It contributes a component of the odor and flavor of anise and fennel, anise myrtle, liquorice, camphor, magnolia blossoms. Closely related to anethole is its isomer estragole, abundant in tarragon and basil and it is a colorless, fragrant, mildly volatile liquid. Anethole is only soluble in water but exhibits high solubility in ethanol. This difference causes certain anise-flavored liqueurs to become opaque when diluted with water, anethole is an aromatic, unsaturated ether related to lignols. It exists as both isomers, involving the double bond outside the ring. The more abundant isomer, and the one preferred for use, is the trans or E isomer, like related compounds, anethole is poorly soluble in water. Historically, this property was used to detect adulteration in samples, most anethole is obtained from terpentine-like extracts from trees. Of only minor commercial significance, anethole can also be isolated from essential oils and it is also readily prepared from anisole and propionic acid via the intermediacy of 4-methoxypropiophenone. It is distinctly sweet, measuring 13 times sweeter than sugar and it is perceived as being pleasant to the taste even at higher concentrations. It is used in alcoholic drinks ouzo, rakı and Pernod and it is also used in seasoning and confectionery applications, oral hygiene products, and in small quantities in natural berry flavors. Because they metabolize anethole into several chemical compounds, some bacteria are candidates for use in commercial bioconversion of anethole to more valuable materials. Bacterial strains capable of using trans-anethole as the carbon source include JYR-1. Anethole has potent antimicrobial properties, against bacteria, yeast, reported antibacterial properties include both bacteriostatic and bactericidal action against Salmonella enterica but not when used against Salmonella via a fumigation method. Anethole also has activity against the plant nematode Meloidogyne javanica in vitro. Anethole also is a promising insecticide, several essential oils consisting mostly of anethole have insecticidal action against larvae of the mosquitos Ochlerotatus caspius and Aedes aegypti. In a similar manner, anethole itself is effective against the fungus gnat Lycoriella ingenua, against the mite, anethole is a slightly more effective pesticide than DEET, but anisaldehyde, a related natural compound that occurs with anethole in many essential oils, is 14 times more effective
40.
China
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China, officially the Peoples Republic of China, is a unitary sovereign state in East Asia and the worlds most populous country, with a population of over 1.381 billion. The state is governed by the Communist Party of China and its capital is Beijing, the countrys major urban areas include Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Tianjin and Hong Kong. China is a power and a major regional power within Asia. Chinas landscape is vast and diverse, ranging from forest steppes, the Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir and Tian Shan mountain ranges separate China from much of South and Central Asia. The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers, the third and sixth longest in the world, respectively, Chinas coastline along the Pacific Ocean is 14,500 kilometers long and is bounded by the Bohai, Yellow, East China and South China seas. China emerged as one of the worlds earliest civilizations in the basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, Chinas political system was based on hereditary monarchies known as dynasties, in 1912, the Republic of China replaced the last dynasty and ruled the Chinese mainland until 1949, when it was defeated by the communist Peoples Liberation Army in the Chinese Civil War. The Communist Party established the Peoples Republic of China in Beijing on 1 October 1949, both the ROC and PRC continue to claim to be the legitimate government of all China, though the latter has more recognition in the world and controls more territory. China had the largest economy in the world for much of the last two years, during which it has seen cycles of prosperity and decline. Since the introduction of reforms in 1978, China has become one of the worlds fastest-growing major economies. As of 2016, it is the worlds second-largest economy by nominal GDP, China is also the worlds largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. China is a nuclear weapons state and has the worlds largest standing army. The PRC is a member of the United Nations, as it replaced the ROC as a permanent member of the U. N. Security Council in 1971. China is also a member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the WTO, APEC, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the BCIM, the English name China is first attested in Richard Edens 1555 translation of the 1516 journal of the Portuguese explorer Duarte Barbosa. The demonym, that is, the name for the people, Portuguese China is thought to derive from Persian Chīn, and perhaps ultimately from Sanskrit Cīna. Cīna was first used in early Hindu scripture, including the Mahābhārata, there are, however, other suggestions for the derivation of China. The official name of the state is the Peoples Republic of China. The shorter form is China Zhōngguó, from zhōng and guó and it was then applied to the area around Luoyi during the Eastern Zhou and then to Chinas Central Plain before being used as an occasional synonym for the state under the Qing
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South Asia
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Topographically, it is dominated by the Indian Plate, which rises above sea level as Nepal and northern parts of India situated south of the Himalayas and the Hindu Kush. South Asia is bounded on the south by the Indian Ocean and on land by West Asia, Central Asia, East Asia, the current territories of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka form the countries of South Asia. The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation is an economic cooperation organisation in the region which was established in 1985, South Asia covers about 5.1 million km², which is 11. 51% of the Asian continent or 3. 4% of the worlds land surface area. The population of South Asia is about 1.749 billion or about one fourth of the worlds population, overall, it accounts for about 39. 49% of Asias population and is home to a vast array of peoples. The area of South Asia and its extent is not clear cut as systemic. Aside from the region of South Asia, formerly part of the British Empire, there is a high degree of variation as to which other countries are included in South Asia. Modern definitions of South Asia are consistent in including Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar is included by some scholars in South Asia, but in Southeast Asia by others. Some do not include Afghanistan, others question whether Afghanistan should be considered a part of South Asia or the Middle East, the mountain countries of Nepal and Bhutan, and the island countries of Sri Lanka and Maldives are generally included as well. Myanmar is often added, and by various deviating definitions based on often substantially different reasons, the British Indian Ocean Territory, the common concept of South Asia is largely inherited from the administrative boundaries of the British Raj, with several exceptions. The Aden Colony, British Somaliland and Singapore, though administered at various times under the Raj, have not been proposed as any part of South Asia. Additionally Burma was administered as part of the Raj until 1937, the 562 princely states that were protected by but not directly ruled by the Raj became administrative parts of South Asia upon joining Union of India or Dominion of Pakistan. China and Myanmar have also applied for the status of members of SAARC. This bloc of countries include two independent countries that were not part of the British Raj – Nepal, and Bhutan, Afghanistan was a British protectorate from 1878 until 1919, after the Afghans lost to the British in the Second Anglo-Afghan war. The United Nations Statistics Divisions scheme of sub-regions include all eight members of the SAARC as part of Southern Asia, population Information Network includes Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burma, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka as part of South Asia. Maldives, in view of its characteristics, was admitted as a member Pacific POPIN subregional network only in principle, the Hirschman–Herfindahl index of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific for the region includes only the original seven signatories of SAARC. The British Indian Ocean Territory is connected to the region by a publication of Janes for security considerations, the inclusion of Myanmar in South Asia is without consensus, with many considering it a part of southeast Asia and others including it within South Asia. Afghanistan was of importance to the British colonial empire, especially after the Second Anglo-Afghan War over 1878–1880, Afghanistan remained a British protectorate until 1919, when a treaty with Vladimir Lenin included the granting of independence to Afghanistan. Following Indias partition, Afghanistan has generally included in South Asia
42.
Southeast Asia
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Southeast Asia or Southeastern Asia is a subregion of Asia, consisting of the countries that are geographically south of China, east of India, west of New Guinea and north of Australia. The region lies near the intersection of geological plates, with seismic and volcanic activity. Southeast Asia consists of two regions, Mainland Southeast Asia, also known historically as Indochina, comprising Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar. Maritime Southeast Asia, comprising Indonesia, East Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, East Timor, Brunei, Cocos Islands, definitions of Southeast Asia vary, but most definitions include the area represented by the countries listed below. All of the states are members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the area, together with part of South Asia, was widely known as the East Indies or simply the Indies until the 20th century. Sovereignty issues exist over some territories in the South China Sea, Papua New Guinea has stated that it might join ASEAN, and is currently an observer. Southeast Asia is geographically divided into two subregions, namely Mainland Southeast Asia and Maritime Southeast Asia, Mainland Southeast Asia includes, Maritime Southeast Asia includes, The Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India are geographically considered part of Southeast Asia. Eastern Bangladesh and the Seven Sister States of India are culturally part of Southeast Asia, the eastern half of Indonesia and East Timor are considered to be biogeographically part of Oceania. Homo sapiens reached the region by around 45,000 years ago, homo floresiensis also lived in the area up until 12,000 years ago, when they became extinct. Austronesian people, who form the majority of the population in Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, East Timor. Solheim and others have shown evidence for a Nusantao maritime trading network ranging from Vietnam to the rest of the archipelago as early as 5000 BC to 1 AD. The peoples of Southeast Asia, especially those of Austronesian descent, have been seafarers for thousands of years and their vessels, such as the vinta, were ocean-worthy. Magellans voyage records how much more manoeuvrable their vessels were, as compared to the European ships, Passage through the Indian Ocean aided the colonisation of Madagascar by the Austronesian people, as well as commerce between West Asia and Southeast Asia. Gold from Sumatra is thought to have reached as far west as Rome and this was later replaced by Hinduism. Theravada Buddhism soon followed in 525, in the 15th century, Islamic influences began to enter. This forced the last Hindu court in Indonesia to retreat to Bali, in Mainland Southeast Asia, Burma, Cambodia and Thailand retained the Theravada form of Buddhism, brought to them from Sri Lanka. This type of Buddhism was fused with the Hindu-influenced Khmer culture, very little is known about Southeast Asian religious beliefs and practices before the advent of Indian merchants and religious influences from the 2nd century BCE onwards. Prior to the 13th century CE, Hinduism and Buddhism were the religions in Southeast Asia
43.
East Asia
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East Asia is the eastern subregion of the Asian continent, which can be defined in either geographical or ethno-cultural terms. Geographically and geopolitically, it includes China, Taiwan, Mongolia, Korea and Japan, it covers about 12,000,000 km2, or about 28% of the Asian continent, the East Asian people comprise more than 1.5 billion people. About 38% of the population of Asia and 22%, or over one fifth, the overall population density of the region is 133 inhabitants per square kilometre, about three times the world average of 45/km2. Historically, societies in East Asia have been part of the Chinese cultural sphere, major religions include Buddhism, Confucianism or Neo-Confucianism, Taoism, Chinese folk religion in China and Taiwan, Shinto in Japan, Korean shamanism in Korea. Shamanism is also prevalent among Mongolians and other populations of northern East Asia. The Chinese calendar is the root from which many other East Asian calendars are derived, Chinese Dynasties dominated the region in matters of culture, trade, and exploration as well as militarily for a very long time. There are records of tributes sent overseas from the kingdoms of Korea. There were also considerable levels of cultural and religious exchange between the Chinese and other regional Dynasties and Kingdoms, as connections began to strengthen with the Western world, Chinas power began to diminish. Around the same time, Japan solidified itself as a nation state, throughout World War II, Korea, Taiwan, much of eastern China, Hong Kong, and Vietnam all fell under Japanese control. Culturally, China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and Vietnam are commonly seen as being encompassed by cultural East Asia, there are mixed debates around the world whether these countries or regions should be considered in East Asia or not. Vietnam Siberia in Russia Sovereignty issues exist over some territories in the South China Sea, however, in this context, the term Far East is often more appropriate which covers ASEAN countries and the countries in East Asia. However, being a Eurocentric term, Far East describes the geographical position in relation to Europe rather than its location within Asia. Alternatively, the term Asia Pacific Region is often used in describing East Asia and this usage, which is seen in economic and diplomatic discussions, is at odds with the historical meanings of both East Asia and Northeast Asia. The Council on Foreign Relations defines Northeast Asia as Japan and Korea, the military and economic superpower of China became the largest economy in the world in 2014, surpassing the United States of America. Currently in East Asia, trading systems are open, and zero or low duties on imports of consumer and capital goods etc. have considerably helped stimulate cost-efficiency. Free and flexible labor and other markets are important factors making for high levels of business-economic performance. East Asian populations have demonstrated highly positive work ethics, there are relatively large and fast-growing markets for consumer goods and services of all kinds. The culture of East Asia has been influenced by the civilisation of China, East Asia, as well as Vietnam, share a Confucian ethical philosophy, Buddhism, political and legal structures, and historically a common writing system
44.
Steam distillation
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Steam distillation is a special type of distillation for temperature sensitive materials like natural aromatic compounds. It once was a laboratory method for purification of organic compounds. Steam distillation remains important in industrial sectors. Many organic compounds tend to decompose at high sustained temperatures, separation by distillation at the normal boiling points is not an option, so water or steam is introduced into the distillation apparatus. The water vapor carries small amounts of the compounds to the condensation flask. This process effectively allows for distillation at lower temperatures, reducing the deterioration of the desired products, if the substances to be distilled are very sensitive to heat, steam distillation may be applied under reduced pressure, thereby reducing the operating temperature further. After distillation the vapors are condensed, usually the immediate product is a two-phase system of water and the organic distillate, allowing for separation of the components by decantation, partitioning or other suitable methods. Consequently, the pressure of the whole system increases. Boiling begins when the sum of the pressures of the two immiscible liquids just exceeds the atmospheric pressure. In this way, many organic compounds insoluble in water can be purified at a well below the point at which decomposition occurs. For example, the point of bromobenzene is 156 °C and the boiling point of water is 100 °C. Thus, bromobenzene can be distilled at a temperature 61 °C below its normal boiling point. Steam distillation is employed in the isolation of essential oils, for use in perfumes, in this method, steam is passed through the plant material containing the desired oils. Eucalyptus oil and orange oil are obtained by this method on an industrial scale, steam distillation is also sometimes used to separate intermediate or final products during the synthesis of complex organic compounds. Steam distillation is also used in petroleum refineries and petrochemical plants where it is commonly referred to as steam stripping. On a lab scale, steam distillations are carried out using steam generated outside the system and piped through macerated biomass or steam generated in-situ using a Clevenger-type apparatus
Baynes, T.S., ed. (1878), "Anise", Encyclopædia Britannica, 2 (9th ed.), New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, pp. 57–58
Baynes, T.S., ed. (1878), "