Question

Edible part of the coconut fruit is
(a) Epicarp
(b) Mesocarp
(c) Endocarp
(d) Endosperm

Answer 1

Coconut fruit is considered a drupe which is the most useful and provides food, folk medicine and cosmetics among many other uses. It consists of an inner flash which consists of coconut milk which is consumed by many people in their regular diets.

Complete answer:
The edible part of the coconut fruit is the endosperm. The endosperm in coconut is formed as a result of triple fusion in which the one sperm gets fused with two polar nuclei and the primary endosperm nucleus performs division repeatedly through mitotic divisions without the formation of walls which results in a large number of free nuclei present in the embryo sac. The cell wall starts forming after the completion of division which makes the periphery of the embryo sac which makes the endosperm free nuclear in its centre and multicellular at its periphery.
The endosperm is a tissue which is produced inside the seeds of most flowering plants. Fertilization takes place after the production of seeds and it consists of three chromosomes which are triploid and get surrounded by the embryo which provides nutrition in the form of starch. It also contains oils and proteins and makes the endosperm a source of nutrition in animal diets. Orchids have seeds that contain no endosperm in them. They are mycoheterotrophic in their early developmental stage and in some species, the endosperm does not develop. Aleurone is the outermost layer of the endosperm which is present in all small grains and in many dicots it gets retained with transient endosperm. It secretes the amylase enzyme during germination which breaks the endosperm starch into sugars to nourish the growing seedling.

So, the correct answer is 'endosperm'.

Note:
The coconut is known to be not like other drupe fruits as it does not get dispersed through the consumption of wildlife and its palm disperses its seed using the ocean. It is highly water-resistant and buoyant. Coconut can travel long distances across the ocean.