ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the structure of flowers, the reproductive cycle, and seed formation. Seed is the end product of sexual reproduction that takes place through sequential changes in the reproductive shoot, the flower in angiosperms. The ovules are borne in a closed structure, the ovary. Sepals are more or less leaflike or bractlike in form, structure, and vasculature. They are usually green and rarely petaloid. The development of microsporangium is fairly uniform in angiosperms. The chalaza may or may not undergo significant changes in seed. The seed coat development for some economically important plants, e.g., for true seeds of Brassica, Hibiscus, Gossypium, Crotalaria, Lycopersicon, Cucurbita, Sechium , and one-seeded indehiscent fruits of Lactuca and Triticum, is described. A succession of events in the fertile appendages, stamen and carpel, of the flower leads to seed formation. The sterile as well as fertile appendages of the flower have direct connection with the mother plant through vascular traces.
