GYMNOSPERM

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does gymnosperm mean? 

• GYMNOSPERM (noun)
  The noun GYMNOSPERM has 1 sense:

1. plants of the class Gymnospermae having seeds not enclosed in an ovary

  Familiarity information: GYMNOSPERM used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• GYMNOSPERM (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Plants of the class Gymnospermae having seeds not enclosed in an ovary

Classified under:

Nouns denoting plants

Hypernyms ("gymnosperm" is a kind of...):

phanerogam; seed plant; spermatophyte (plant that reproduces by means of seeds not spores)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "gymnosperm"):

progymnosperm (an ancestral fossil type from which modern gymnosperms are thought to have derived)

welwitschia; Welwitschia mirabilis (curious plant of arid regions of southwestern Africa having a yard-high and yard-wide trunk like a turnip with a deep taproot and two large persistent woody straplike leaves growing from the base; living relic of a flora long disappeared; some may be 700-5000 years old)

cycad (any tropical gymnosperm of the order Cycadales; having unbranched stems with a crown of fernlike leaves)

pteridosperm; seed fern (an extinct seed-producing fernlike plant of the order Cycadofilicales (or group Pteridospermae))

Holonyms ("gymnosperm" is a member of...):

class Gymnospermae; division Gymnospermophyta; Gymnospermae; Gymnospermophyta (plants having naked seeds not enclosed in an ovary; in some systems considered a class (Gymnospermae) and in others a division (Gymnospermophyta); comprises three subdivisions (or classes): Cycadophytina (class Cycadopsida) and Gnetophytina (class Gnetopsida) and Coniferophytina (class Coniferopsida); in some classifications the Coniferophytina are divided into three groups: Pinophytina (class Pinopsida) and Ginkgophytina (class Ginkgopsida) and Taxophytina (class Taxopsida))

Derivation:

gymnospermous (relating to or characteristic of plants of the class Gymnospermae)

 Context examples 

The flowering seed plants, as differentiated from gymnosperms, the non-flowering seed plants.

(Angiosperms, NOAA Paleoclimate Glossary)

This term is to be used for the macro-algae, Embryophytes (mosses), and Tracheophytes (angiosperms, gymnosperms, etc.)

(Plant Genetics, NIH CRISP Thesaurus)