gymnosperm family
- noun
- /ˈdʒɪmnəˌspɜrm ˈfæmɪli/
- Specialized
:
familia de gimnospermas
- The pine tree belongs to the gymnosperm family Pinaceae, which includes many evergreen species.
Examples
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Some of the oldest plants on Earth come from the gymnosperm family Cycadaceae.
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The gymnosperm family includes various species of conifers.
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Scientists studied the diversity within each gymnosperm family to understand their evolutionary history.
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Many gymnosperm families thrive in cold climates.
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Scientists studied the diversity within each gymnosperm family to understand their evolutionary history.
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The pine tree belongs to the gymnosperm family Pinaceae, which includes many evergreen species.
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Some of the oldest plants on Earth come from the gymnosperm family Cycadaceae.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly and transparently derived from combining 'gymnosperm' (plants whose seeds are not enclosed) with 'family' (a scientific grouping of related species), yielding a taxonomic family composed of gymnosperms. This noun+family composition is a regular, compositional pattern found across languages and would be predictable to learners who know both constituent words.
Etymology
Gymnosperm family comes from the words behind the plants: gymnosperm literally means 'naked seed' because these plants make seeds without flowers and often hold them on cones, and family means a group of related species. So a gymnosperm family is a group of related seed plants, like pines or cycads, that do not have flowers.
