A, Cell (individual) of the unicellular Green Alga Pleurococcus, as an example of an undifferentiated autonomous assimilating cell.
By budding is understood the formation of a new individual from a fresh growth of undifferentiated material.
From the primitive uniform Systems. mass of undifferentiated assimilating cells, which we may conceive of as the starting-point of differentiation, though such an undifferentiated body is only actually realized in the thallus of the lower Algae, there is, (1) on the one hand, a specialization of a surface layer regulating the immediate relations of the plant with its surroundings.
Sometimes development stops altogether, and a layer of undifferentiated parenchyma (the mesodesm) is left between them; or it may continue indefinitely, the central cells keeping pace by their tangential division with the differentiation of tissue on each side.
It does not at first appear to be the same with the bulkier plants, such as the ordinary green herbs, shrubs or trees, but a study of their earlier development indicates that they do not at the outset differ in any way from the simple undifferentiated forms. Each commences its existence as a simple naked protoplast, in the embroyo-sac or the archegonium, as the case may be.
