A plant tissue layer known as a cambium (plural cambiums or cambia) offers partly unspecialised cells for plant development. It arranges the cells into parallel rows that become secondary tissues. It is found between the xylem and the phloem. Cambium is also known as a cellular plant tissue from which cork, phloem, or xylem proliferates through division, causing secondary thickening in woody plants.
The primary growth tissue in the roots and stems of several plants, mainly in dicots like oak and buttercup trees, gymnosperms like pine trees, and in some other vascular plants, is known as the vascular cambium. It produces secondary phloem extending outward towards the bark and secondary xylem that grows inward into the pith.
It develops into a continuous ring of unspecialised meristem cells in woody plants, from which the new tissues develop. It does not transfer water, nutrients, or food across the plant the way phloem and xylem do. The vascular cambium is also known as the wood cambium, main cambium, or bifacial cambium.
The vascular cambium is the distinct boundary separating the bark from the wood in gymnosperm and dicot trees. Dicots and gymnosperms have vascular cambia, but monocots don’t because they don’t have secondary growth. Vascular cambium is also present in a few leaf varieties. Cork cambium is also present in them. The rootstock and scion’s vascular cambia must be aligned to grow together for grafting to be successful.
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