Coconuts & Trivia
 

Coconut fruits are drupes, with the outer layers of the husk
representing the exocarp and mesocarp. The "shell" of the de-husked
coconut that one buys in the store is the endocarp, with the seed
inside. Botanical trivia: Coconut endosperm starts out as a
liquid--lots of nuclei, no cell walls--and gradually solidifies into
the white "meat." There's a little embryo in there that will emerge
from one of the "eyes" in the endocarp.

Plant scientists studying growth regulators and embryo development
tried squirting hundreds and hundreds of things into their cell
cultures. On a whim, someone tried coconut milk. Pow! Results.
Since then, several hundred cytokinin derivatives have been isolated
from coconut milk. See:
http://www.biologie.uni-hamburg.de/b-online/e31/31c.htm

Monique Reed
in cold and wet Texas A&M

So what *is* the seed in the coconut fruit? Just the embryo?

Coconuts & Trivia
 

Sounds about right.

The terminology of fruits seems pretty esoteric
(one would almost sympathize with cereoid with his banana,
regarded by some as a pepo but usually as just a berry).

Since you have all this stuff ready at your fingertips,
maybe you'd like to comment on arilloids
and the difference between
an aril (as in Taxus ) and
an arillode (as in Garcinia)
with apparently both occurring in Myristica,
not to mention other forms of arilloids

It is pretty weird that in the Gymnosperms which are
not supposed to have fruits there are such things as
Taxus and Torreya with both having something very
fruitlike surrounding the seeds.
PvR

(weather here is pleasant, well above freezing point
and raining only part of the day)

Monique Reed schreef
Coconut fruits are drupes, with the outer layers of the husk
representing the exocarp and mesocarp. The "shell" of the de-husked
coconut that one buys in the store is the endocarp, with the seed
inside. Botanical trivia: Coconut endosperm starts out as a
liquid--lots of nuclei, no cell walls--and gradually solidifies into
the white "meat." There's a little embryo in there that will emerge
from one of the "eyes" in the endocarp.

Plant scientists studying growth regulators and embryo development
tried squirting hundreds and hundreds of things into their cell
cultures. On a whim, someone tried coconut milk. Pow! Results.
Since then, several hundred cytokinin derivatives have been isolated
from coconut milk. See:
http://www.biologie.uni-hamburg.de/b-online/e31/31c.htm

Monique Reed
in cold and wet Texas A&M

Coconuts & Trivia
 

In article ,
Monique Reed wrote:
Coconut fruits are drupes, with the outer layers of the husk
representing the exocarp and mesocarp. The "shell" of the de-husked
coconut that one buys in the store is the endocarp, with the seed
inside. Botanical trivia: Coconut endosperm starts out as a
liquid--lots of nuclei, no cell walls--and gradually solidifies into
the white "meat." There's a little embryo in there that will emerge
from one of the "eyes" in the endocarp.

G'day Monique,

Thank you for the response. One further query:

In my experience with coconuts, the fully grown but still immature
fruit have the best juice for drinking, and the "flesh" or "meat" is
rather gelatinous.

Freshly fallen mature fruit also have quite acceptable juice for
drinking, but the "flesh" [endosperm] is by this time quite hard and
almost brittle.

Do you have any idea what changes have occurred in the juice in this
process of maturation? Clearly, not all of it solidifies.


Plant scientists studying growth regulators and embryo development
tried squirting hundreds and hundreds of things into their cell
cultures. On a whim, someone tried coconut milk. Pow! Results.
Since then, several hundred cytokinin derivatives have been isolated
from coconut milk. See:
http://www.biologie.uni-hamburg.de/b-online/e31/31c.htm

Monique Reed
in cold and wet Texas A&M

So what *is* the seed in the coconut fruit? Just the embryo?

Cheers, Phred.

--
LID