Gynoecium

Gynoecium refers to the collective female reproductive organs of a flower. It includes the ovary, style, and stigma, and can also be defined as the entire pistil or the set of one or more carpels that bear ovules. The basic unit is the carpel, which encloses ovules and contributes to the formation of the fruit. When several carpels are fused, the gynoecium is described as syncarpous; when carpels are separate, it is apocarpous. The ovary houses ovules; after fertilization, the ovules develop into seeds and the ovary often develops into the fruit. The structure may be unilocular or multi-locular, depending on the number of locules formed by the arrangement of the carpels, and the placentation describes how ovules attach within the ovary (axile, parietal, or marginal types).

Stigma and style provide the stigma for pollen capture and a conduit for pollen tubes to reach the ovules. The position of the ovary relative to other floral parts is described as superior (hypogynous), inferior (epigynous), or partially inferior (perigynous). The gynoecium is the innermost floral whorl and is the most variable part of the flower, playing a central role in reproduction, as well as in taxonomy and evolutionary studies.