Question

Which one of the following is common to multicellular fungi, filamentous algae and protonema of mosses?
A) Diplontic life cycle
B) Members of kingdom plantae
C) Mode of Nutrition
D) Multiplication by fragmentation

Answer 1

Hint: Fragmentation occurs in a case where the organism breaks off. These broken fragments from the organism start to grow into many organisms. Regeneration is actually a case under asexual reproduction in which organisms are capable of regrowing their lost parts.

Complete Answer:
1) Diplontic life cycle — The gametes undergo meiosis, the diploid sporophyte happens to be the dominant as well as independent phase. The gametes are the haploid stage and are called a gametophyte.
2) Multicellular fungi are members of kingdom Fungi, Algae and Mosses belong to kingdom plantae.
3) Mode of nutrition in fungi is saprophytic, in algae and mosses it is photoautotrophic mode of nutrition.
4) The common factor between all three happens to be multiplication by fragmentation. Fragmentation is a mode under asexual reproduction. In this case the organism is split into many fragments. These fragments actually grow into matured organisms which are morphologically and genetically similar to their parents.

So, the correct answer is option (D) 'Multiplication by fragmentation'.

Note: Fungi are saprophytes, have tubular structures called as hyphae, the hyphae are filaments growing and forming branches on dead and decaying matter. They release digestive enzymes to break the complex substances into simpler forms.
The filamentous algae are the microscopic plant colonies which form linking together in order to form the threads and mesh-like filament structures.