Outline of botany


The following outline is an overview of and topical guide to botany, the biological academic discipline involving the study of plants.

Core concepts

Subdisciplines

Branches of botany

Core branches

Classification

Environment and ecology

Historical

  • Paleobotany - study of fossil plants
  • Paleoethnobotany/Archaeobotany - study of past human-plant interactions through the recovery and analysis of ancient plant remains
  • Paleophycology/Paleoalgology - subdiscipline of paleobotany dealing with the study and identification of fossil algae and their evolutionary relationships and ecology

Applied

  • Agroforestry/Agro-sylviculture/fForest farming - polyculture land use management system that integrates trees with crops or pasture, combining agricultural and forestry technologies
  • Agronomy - science and technology of producing and using plants by agriculture for food, fuel, fiber, chemicals, recreation, or land conservation
  • Arboriculture - culture and propagation of trees
  • Economic botany - study of the relationship between people and plants of economic use and value.
  • Ethnobotany - interdisciplinary field that studies the relationships between humans and plants, focusing on traditional knowledge of how plants are selected, used, managed, and perceived in human societies
  • Floriculture - branch of horticulture which studies the efficient production of the plants that produce showy, colorful flowers and foliage for human enjoyment in human environments
  • Forestry - management and conservation of forests
  • Horticulture - cultivation of garden plants
  • Marine botany - study of aquatic plants and algae that live in seawater
  • Olericulture - study of vegetables
  • Plant biotechnology - technology to modify plants and using plants to synthesize products
  • Plant breeding - science of changing the traits of plants in order to produce desired characteristics and improve the quality of plant products for use by humans and animals
  • Pomology - study of fruits and nuts and their cultivation
  • Silviculture - practice of controlling the growth, composition/structure, as well as quality of forests to meet values and needs, specifically timber production
  • Viticulture/Viniculture/Winegrowing - branch of horticulture dealing with the cultivation and harvesting of grapes

Disease

Emerging and nontraditional

  • Plant intelligence/Plant neurobiology - study of how plants process information from and sense, communicate, and respond to their environment
  • Plant bioacoustics - study of how plants produce, perceive, and respond to sounds and vibrations in their environment

Plant physiology

History

Major plant groups

Lists

General species concepts

Notable botanists

In alphabetical order by surname:

Scholarly societies