Trichome

Flower bud of a Capsicum pubescens plant, with many trichomes.

Trichomes (/ˈtraɪkoʊmz/ or /ˈtrɪkoʊmz/; from the Greek τρίχωμα - trikhoma meaning hair") are fine outgrowths or appendages on plants and certain protists. These are of diverse structure and function. Examples are hairs, glandular hairs, scales, and papillae.

Algal trichomes

Certain (usually filamentous) algae have the terminal cell produced into an elongate "hair-like" structure called a trichome. The same term is applied to such structures in some cyanobacteria, such as Spirulina and Oscillatoria. Cyanobacteria trichomes may be unsheathed, as in Oscillatoria, or sheathed, as in Calothrix.^[1] These structures play an important role in preventing soil erosion, particularly in cold desert climates.^{[citation needed]} The filamentous sheaths form a persistent sticky network that helps maintain soil structure.

Plant trichomes

Aerial surface hairs

Drosera capensis with a trapped insect

Trichomes on Cannabis, rich in cannabinoids.

Trichomes on surface of a Solanum scabrum leaf

Trichomes on the petiole of a Solanum quitoense leaf

Epiderm of Arabidopsis thaliana with a trichome.

An unopened Streptocarpus hybrid flower, showing star-shaped form and trichomes

Trichomes on plants are epidermal outgrowths of various kinds. The terms emergences or prickles refer to outgrowths that involve more than the epidermis. This distinction is not always easily applied (see Wait-a-minute tree). Also, there are nontrichomatous epidermal cells that protrude from the surface.

A common type of trichome is a hair. Plant hairs may be unicellular or multicellular, branched or unbranched. Multicellular hairs may have one or several layers of cells. Branched hairs can be dendritic (tree-like), tufted, or stellate (star-shaped).

A common type of trichome is the scale or peltate hair: a plate or shield-shaped cluster of cells attached directly to the surface or borne on a stalk of some kind.

Any of the various types of hairs may be glandular.

In describing the surface appearance of plant organs, such as stems and leaves, many terms are used in reference to the presence, form, and appearance of trichomes. The most basic terms used are glabrous—lacking hairs— and pubescent—having hairs. Details are provided by:

• glabrous, glabrate – lacking hairs or trichomes; surface smooth
• hirsute – coarsely hairy
• hispid – having bristly hairs
• articulate – simple pluricellular-uniseriate hairs
• downy – having an almost wool-like covering of long hairs
• pilose – pubescent with long, straight, soft, spreading or erect hairs
• puberulent – minutely pubescent; having fine, short, usually curly, hairs
• pubescent – bearing hairs or trichomes of any type
• strigillose – minutely strigose
• strigose – having straight hairs all pointing in more or less the same direction as along a margin or midrib
• tomentellous – minutely tomentose
• tomentose – covered with dense, matted, woolly hairs
• villosulous – minutely villous
• villous – having long, soft hairs, often curved, but not matted

Hairs on plants are extremely variable in their presence across species, location on plant organs, density (even within a species), and therefore functionality. However, several basic functions or advantages of having surface hairs can be listed. It is likely that in many cases, hairs interfere with the feeding of at least some small herbivores and, depending upon stiffness and irritability to the "palate", large herbivores as well. Hairs on plants growing in areas subject to frost keep the frost away from the living surface cells. In windy locations, hairs break-up the flow of air across the plant surface, reducing evaporation. Dense coatings of hairs reflect solar radiation, protecting the more delicate tissues underneath in hot, dry, open habitats. And in locations where much of the available moisture comes from cloud drip, hairs appear to enhance this process.

Root hairs

Root hairs, the rhizoids of many vascular plants, are tubular outgrowths of trichoblasts, the hair-forming cells on the epidermis of a plant root. That is, root hairs are lateral extensions of a single cell and only rarely branched. Just prior to the root hair development, there is a point of elevated phosphorylase activity.

Root hairs vary between 5 and 17 micrometres in diameter, and 80 to 1,500 micrometres in length (Dittmar, cited in Esau, 1965).

Root hairs can survive for 2 to 3 weeks and then die off. At the same time new root hairs are continually being formed at the top of the root. This way, the root hair coverage stays the same.

It is therefore understandable that repotting must be done with care, because the root hairs are being pulled off for the most part. This is why planting out may cause plants to wilt.

Significance for paleontology

Though trichomes are rarely found preserved in fossils, trichome bases are regularly found, and in some cases their cellular structure is an important diagnostic with respect to systematics.^{[citation needed]}

Bud and scape of a Stylidium species, displaying the trichomes that can trap and kill insects

Other human uses

Bean leaves have been used historically to trap bedbugs in houses in Eastern Europe. The trichomes on the bean leaves capture the insects by impaling their feet (tarsi). The leaves would then be destroyed.^[2]

Defense

Plants may use trichomes in order to deter herbivore attack via physical and/or chemical means. However, some organisms have developed mechanisms to resist the effects of trichomes. The larvae of Heliconius charithonia, for example, are able to physically free themselves from trichomes, are able to bite off trichomes, and are able to form silk blankets in order to navigate the leaves better.^[3]

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Trichome.

• Seta
• Kief

References

• Esau, K. 1965. Plant Anatomy, 2nd Edition. John Wiley & Sons. 767 pp.