In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants that is formed from the ovary after flowering. In botanical usage, the term fruit also includes many structures that are not commonly called ‘fruits’ in everyday language, such as nuts, bean pods, corn kernels, tomatoes, and wheat grains. Many common language terms used for fruit and fruit gelee differ from botanical classifications.

For example, in botany, a fruit is a ripened ovary or carpel that contains seeds, e. However, the fruit wall is thin and fused to the seed coat, so almost all the edible grain-fruit is actually a seed. The outer layer, often edible, of most fruits is called the pericarp. The pericarp may be described in three layers from outer to inner, i. Fruit that bears a prominent pointed terminal projection is said to be beaked. A fruit results from the fertilizing and maturing of one or more flowers. The gynoecium, which contains the stigma-style-ovary system, is centered in the flower-head, and it forms all or part of the fruit.

Ovules are fertilized in a process that starts with pollination, which is the movement of pollen from the stamens to the stigma-style-ovary system within the flower-head. Two sperm are transferred from the pollen to a megagametophyte. In some multiseeded fruits, the extent to which a fleshy structure develops is proportional to the number of fertilized ovules. Because several parts of the flower besides the ovary may contribute to the structure of a fruit, it is important to study flower structure to understand how a particular fruit forms. The parts of a flower, showing the stigma-style-ovary system. An apple is a simple fleshy fruit.

In the noni, flowers are produced in time-sequence along the stem. It is possible to see a progression of flowering, fruit development, and fruit ripening. Note the multiple pistils, each of which will produce a drupelet. Each flower will become a blackberry-like aggregate fruit. While the section of a fungus that produces spores is called a fruiting body, fungi are members of the fungi kingdom and not of the plant kingdom. Simple fruits are the result of the ripening-to-fruit of a simple or compound ovary in a single flower with a single pistil. To distribute their seeds, dry fruits may split open and discharge their seeds to the winds, which is called dehiscence.

Strawberry, showing achenes attached to surface. The fruit of this flower is an aggregation of follicles. Berries are a type of simple fleshy fruit that issue from a single ovary. The ovary itself may be compound, with several carpels. In cultivated varieties, the seeds are diminished nearly to non-existence. The strawberry, regardless of its appearance, is classified as a dry, not a fleshy fruit. Schizocarps are dry fruits, though some appear to be fleshy.

Detail of the raspberry flower: there is a clustering of pistils at the center of the flower. A pistil consists of stigma, style, and ovary. Different types of aggregate fruits can produce different etaerios, such as achenes, drupelets, follicles, and berries. Annona species: an etaerio of berries.

The pistils of the raspberry are called drupelets because each pistil is like a small drupe attached to the receptacle. Progressive stages of multiple flowering and fruit development can be observed on a single branch of the Indian mulberry, or noni. During the sequence of development, a progression of second, third, and more inflorescences are initiated in turn at the head of the branch or stem. Fruits may incorporate tissues derived from other floral parts besides the ovary, including the receptacle, hypanthium, petals, or sepals.