Pollen tube the pollen tube responds to extracellular guidance signals to achieve fertilization. Pollen tubes are produced by the male gametophytes of seed plants. They act as conduits to transport the male gamete cells from the pollen grain—either from the stigma (in flowering plants) to the ovules at the base of the pistil or directly through ovule tissue in some gymnosperms. Pollen tubes were first discovered by Giovanni Battista Amici. Pollen tube formation is important for sexual reproduction to occur in seed plants. Plants have separate structures such as microsporocytes and megasporocytes and the pollen grains are transported to the female gametophyte
Hilum (biology) such a mark, and can be used as a distinguishing characteristic of a seed or spore. Hilum (biology) In botany, a hilum (pronounced ) is a scar or mark left on a seed coat by the former attachment to the ovary wall or to the funiculus (which in turn attaches to the ovary wall). On a bean seed, the hilum is called the "eye". For some species of fungus, the hilum is the microscopic indentation left on a spore when it separates from the sterigma of the basidium. A hilum can also be a nucleus of a starch grain; the