Short Notes:

In flowering plants, pollen combines with an ovule within the flower to produce a seed. When the seed germinates, it grows into a plant like the one that created it. But fungi and the nonflowering plants, which include mosses, ferns, and algae, reproduce in different ways.

These organisms begin life as sporophytes, plants that produce asexual spores, which are similar to seeds but contain only half the genetic information of a seed. When these spores germinate, they produce a new generation of individuals called gametophytes. The gametophytes produce the gametes, or reproductive cells, which are either male or female. When a male and a female gamete join in a body of water, they produce a fertilized egg, called a zygote. The zygote germinates into a sporophyte, which begins the process - called alternation of generations - all over again.