pith (redirected from pithing)

pith, in botany, core of the stem of most plants. Pith is composed of large, loosely packed food-storage cells. As the stem grows older the pith usually dries out, and in some it disintegrates and the stem becomes hollow. In trees the pith becomes much reduced as the woody tissue (xylem) grows. In East Asia, rice paper is made from the pith of some shrubs. Candlewicks are made of the pith of certain rushes.

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pith

1. the soft fibrous tissue lining the inside of the rind in fruits such as the orange and grapefruit

2. Botany the central core of unspecialized cells surrounded by conducting tissue in stems

3. the soft central part of a bone, feather, etc.

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Pith

The central zone of tissue of an axis in which the vascular tissue is arranged as a hollow cylinder. Pith is present in most stems and in some roots. Stems without pith rarely occur in angiosperms but are characteristic of psilopsids, lycopsids, Sphenophyllum, and some ferns. Roots of some ferns, many monocotyledons, and some dicotyledons include a pith, although most roots have xylem tissue in the center.

Pith is composed usually of parenchyma cells often arranged in longitudinal files. This arrangement results from predominantly transverse division of pith mother cells near the apical meristem. See Parenchyma, Root (botany), Stem