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In biology, metamerism is the phenomenon of having a linear series of body segments fundamentally similar in structure, though not all such structures are entirely alike in any single life form because some of them perform special functions.[1] In animals, metameric segments are referred to as somites or metameres. In plants, they are referred to as metamers or, more concretely, phytomers.
A metamer is one of several segments that share in the construction of a shoot, or into which a shoot may be conceptually (at least) resolved.[5] In the metameristic model, a plant consists of a series of 'phytons' or phytomers, each consisting of an internode and its upper node with the attached leaf. As Asa Gray (1850) wrote:[6]
The branch, or simple stem itself, is manifestly an assemblage of similar parts, placed one above another in a continuous series, developed one from another in successive generations. Each one of these joints of stem, bearing its leaf at the apex, is a plant element; or as we term it a phyton,—a potential plant, having all the organs of vegetation, namely, stem, leaf, and in its downward development even a root, or its equivalent. This view of the composition of the plant, though by no means a new one, has not been duly appreciated. I deem it essential to a correct philosophical understanding of the plant.
Some plants, particularly grasses, demonstrate a rather clear metameric construction, but many others either lack discrete modules or their presence is more arguable.[5] Phyton theory has been criticized as an over-ingenious, academic conception which bears little relation to reality.[7] Eames (1961) concluded that "concepts of the shoot as consisting of a series of structural units have been obscured by the dominance of the stem- and leaf-theory. Anatomical units like these do not exist: the shoot is the basic unit."[8] Even so, others still consider comparative study along the length of the metameric organism to be a fundamental aspect of plant morphology.[9]
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