Definition: A taxon is Near Threatened when it has been evaluated against the criteria but does not qualify for Critically Endangered, Endangered or Vulnerable now, but is close to qualifying for or is likely to qualify for a threatened category in the near future
Definition: A shape for a biological structure that approximates an ellipsoid. (eg: for a cell, see Table 1, Olenina, I., Hajdu, S., Edler, L., Andersson, A., Wasmund, N., Busch, S., Göbel, J., Gromisz, S., Huseby, S., Huttunen, M., Jaanus, A., Kokkonen, P., Ledaine, I. and Niemkiewicz, E. 2006. Biovolumes and size-classes of phytoplankton in the Baltic Sea. HELCOM Balt.Sea Environ. Proc. No. 106, 144pp.)
Definition: Of plant duration, a plant whose life span extends over more than two growing seasons, c.f. annual, biennial, ephemeral, of flowering with respect to architecture, hapaxanthic, monocarpic, pleonanthic
Definition: an inflorescence with a monopodial growth habit, composed at flowering stage of indeterminate, first order inflorescence axes and sessile, unisexual flowers each subtended by conspicuous inflorescence bracts
Definition: one of three metabolic pathways for carbon fixation in photosynthesis, along with C4 and CAM. This process converts carbon dioxide and ribulose bisphosphate (RuBP, a 5-carbon sugar) into 3-phosphoglycerate through the following reaction:\r\n\r\nCO2 + H2O + RuBP → (2) 3-phosphoglycerate\r\n\r\nThis reaction occurs in all plants as the first step of the Calvin–Benson cycle.
Definition: A terrestrial plant is a plant that grows on or in or from land. Other types of plants are aquatic (living in water), epiphytic (living on trees) and lithophytic (living in or on rocks)
Definition: a plant that produces wood as its structural tissue. Wood is a structural cellular adaptation that allows woody plants to grow from above ground stems year after year, thus making some woody plants the largest and tallest terrestrial plants. Wood is usually primarily composed of xylem cells with cell walls made of cellulose and lignin
