Botany Exam 1

What is plant molecular biology?

Structure and function of biological molecules

What is plant cell biology?

Study of cell structure and function

When was plant cell biology increased?

20th century with electron microscopes

What is plant genetics?

Controversial genetic engineering that uses manipulation of genes to improve plant characteristics

What kinds of things does plant genetics do?

Improve resistance, yields, nutrition, etc.

What is plant anatomy?

Internal plant structure

Who were the pioneers of plant anatomy?

Malpighi (1628-1694) and Grew (1641-1712)

What did Malpighi pioneer in plant anatomy?

Stem and root tissues

What did Grew pioneer in plant anatomy?

Structure of wood

What is paleobotany?

Study of plant fossils

What is plant physiology?

Study of plant function

What did Van Helmont (1577-1644) study in plant physiology?

Willow tree growth and water consumption

What is plant morphology?

Study of external strucure and form of plants

What is plant taxonomy also known as?

Plant systematics

What is plant taxonomy?

The naming and classifying relatedness of plants

What is the oldest branch of plant study?

Plant taxonomy

What book did Linnaeus write?

“Species Plantarum”

Are all plants classified?

No, thousands of plant and fungi are not

What do Bryologists study?

Mosses

What is plant geography?

How/why plants are distributed where they areq

What is plant ecology?

Interaction of plants with each other and environment

What is economic botany?

Past, present and future uses of plants by people

What is ethnobotany?

Study of plant uses by indigenous peoples (eg. medicinal uses)

What have humans done to the environment?

Drained wetlands, cleared vegetation, dumped wastes and pollutants in water supplies, polluted atmosphere, killed pests and disease organisms with poisons (and natural predators and useful organisms)

What percentage of wetlands does California have compared to 100 years ago?

Less than 5%

What are examples of ways that humans can restore ecological balance?

Agricultural practices, industrial practices, recycling, replacing poisons with biological controls, water and energy conservation

What are some agricultural practices that can help restore ecological balance?

Returning organic matter to soil after harvest (not just inorganic fertilizers), timber harvest that prevents topsoil erosion, and not clearing brush with chemicals

What is an example of industrial practices that can help restore ecological balance?

Pollutants must be harmless and recycled

What is phytoremediation?

Cleaning up polluted environments with plants

What is an example of phytoremediation?

Russia 1986 Chornobyl nuclear disaster — sunflower plants suspended from styrofoam rafts removed 90% of contaminants in 10 days using roots

What are some examples of ways humans can deal with environmental problems?

Phytoremediation, improving nutritional value of foods for poorly nourished populations, increasing crop yields, and using plant disease control

How many kids does the WHO estimate Vitamin A deficiency blind each year?

250, 000 to 500,000

What is golden rice?

Genetically engineered rice that increases beta-carotene production in grains

How can we increase crop yields?

Roundup herbicide that kills weeds competing for resources, transgenic soybeans containing modified bacterial gene that causes resistance to glyphosate, transgenic citrus seedlings, flower-initiation genes that flower in 6 months instead of 6-20 years

What is one way we implemented plant disease control?

Introduced PRSV-resistant varieties of papaya, allowing commercial papaya farming to regain economic viability in Hawaii

What is the first tenet of the scientific method, source of information?

All accepted information can be derived only from carefully documented and controlled observations or experiments

What is the second tenet of the scientific method, phenomena that can be studied?

Only tangible phenomena and objects are studied

What is the third tenet of the scientific method, constancy and universality?

Physical forces that control the world are constant through time and are the same everywhere

What is the fourth tenet of the scientific method, basis?

The fundamental basis of the scientific method is skepticism

What is the basic form of scientific studies?

Begin with series of observations, follow with a period of experimentation mixed with further observation and analysis, a hypothesis is constructed to account for the observations, the hypothesis is tested in various ways, hypothesis becomes a theory and eventually a law

What are examples of concepts where the scientific method is inappropriate?

Morality and ethics

What is plant metabolism based on?

The principles of chemistry and physics

Plants must have a means of what?

Storing and using information

What do genes and the information they contain do?

Change

Plants must survive where?

In their own environment

What kinds of organisms are plants?

Highly integrated

What is the temporary result of the interaction of genes and environment?

An individual plant

What capacity do plants not have?

Purpose or decision-making capacity

What is biotechnology?

A set of laboratory techniques that allow us to alter plants and animals, giving them new traits and characteristics

What are global warming and climate change caused by?

A buildup of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere caused by burning coal, oil, gas, and the trees of forests everywhere

What is desertification?

The conversion of ordinary forest or grassland to desert

What is habitat loss?

When an area is changed so much that a particular species can no longer survive in the area

What are introduced exotics?

Organisms native to one part of the world but which have been brought to another part, where they thrive

What characteristics do all living beings have?

Metabolism involving exchange of energy and matter within the environment, nonrandom organization, growth, a system of heredity and reproduction, and a capacity to respond to the environment such that metabolism is not adversely affected

How do living organisms use metabolism involving the exchange of energy and matter with the environment?

Absorbing energy and matter, converting some of it into their own bodies, and excreting the rest

What is decay?

The process of the molecules of organisms returning to a random arrangement

What are the two features almost certainly associated with all forms of life?

Organisms develop and species evolve

What kind of bacteria have an unusual type of photosynthesis that differs from that of plants but allows them to absorb carbon dioxide from the environment?

Green bacteria and purple bacteria

Plant life is based on the same fundamental principles that underlie the lives of what?

Animals, fungi, and all other life forms

What is the basic pattern of body organization that plants almost always share?

Stems, leaves, branches, and roots

What is the general goal of vegetative organs?

Getting energy/materials for growth and survival

How do leaves help vegetative organs get energy/materials?

Harvest energy from the sun and package it into glucose

How do roots help vegetative organs get energy/materials?

Obtain minerals and other nutrients

How do stems help vegetative organs get energy/materials?

Bear leaves and give structure/rigidity

What are the regions that leaves attach to the stem?

Nodes

Where are axiliary buds located on the stem?

Just above the nodes

What can axillary buds become?

Branches or flowers

Where are roots almost always confined to?

One end of the stem

What kind of reproductive organs do conifers make?

Seed cones and pollen cones

What kind of reproductive organs do angiosperms make?

Flowers

What are the reproductive organs of ferns?

Foliage leaves that produce sporangia on their underside

What happens when conifer seeds are mature?

It will expand enough to cause the scales to separate and allow the seeds to fall out

What do flowers have?

Carpels, stamens, petals, and sepals

What is the function of sepals?

Protection

What is the function of petals?

Attraction

What is the function of stamen?

Production of pollen

What is the function of carpels?

Development of egg/embryo

What are the three parts that carpels are composed of?

Stigma, style, and ovary

What does the plant tissue epidermis do?

Outer layer that gives protection

What is the cortex?

A more thick area of cells

Where is mesophyll found?

Only in leaves and flowers

What are the vascular tissues?

Xylem and phloem

What does xylem do?

Transport water and minerals upward from roots to all aerial parts

Wnat does phloem do?

Carries sugars and various organic compounds as well as minerals and water throughout the plant?

What usually occur together in vascular bundles?

Xylem and phloem

What have the only primary body produced by cells at the tips of stems and roots?

Herbs

What are usually small plants that live only a few months before they reproduce and die?

Herbs

What are any plant that doesn’t produce wood?

Herbs

Why do woody plants undergo secondary growth?

Possess a secondary meristem, the vascular cambium

What do woody plants produce?

Secondary xylem and secondary phloem

What is the meristem?

The part of the tissue that can keep reproducing new cells of different types

What does a secondary meristem allow for?

More girth

What is the central metabolism by which plants acquire energy?

Photosynthesis

What does the green pigment chlorophyll do?

Captures energy from light

What is used as the starting point for all metabolic pathways?

The carbohydrate

What happens to carboohydrates produced by photosynthesis?

Subsequently converted to many other compounds

What is the formula for photosynthesis?

6CO2 + 6H2O ———> C6H12O6 + 6O2

What are the products of photosynthesis (from carbon dioxide and water)?

Sugar and oxygen

What happens to the oxygen product in photosynthesis?

Released to atmosphere

What happens to the sugar product in photosynthesis?

Some used by the leaf for its own needs, most transported to the rest of the plant