Chapter 36: Resource Aquisition And Transport In Vascular Plants Flashcards
(30 cards)
Movement of Water and Minerals
They are pulled up from the roots by positive pressure, or tension, which is generated by evaporation of water from the leaves.
Movement of Sugars
Pushed by positive pressure from where they are produced or stored to where they are needed. They can be moved both ways between leaves and roots.
Apoplast
Everything external to the plasma membrane of a plant cell, including cell walls, intercellular spaces, and the space within dead structures, such as xylem vessels and tracheids
Symplast
The continuum of cytosol connected by plasmodesmata between cells
Apoplastic route
Water and solutes move along the continuum of cell walls and extracellular spaces
Symplastic Route
Water and solutes move along the continuum of cytosol. This requires the substances to cross a plasma membrane when first entering the plant.
Transmembrane Route
Water and solutes move out of one cell, across the cell wall, and into a neighboring cell. This requires the repeated crossing of plasma membranes as substances exit one cell and enter the next.
Osmosis
The diffusion of free water across a selectively premeable membrane
Water potential
The physical property predicting the direction in which water will flow, governed by solute concentration and applied pressure.
Water potential = solute potential + pressure potential
Solute potential
A component of water potential that is proportional to the molar of its solution and that measures the effect of solutes on the direction of water movement; it can be either negative or zero
Pressure potential
A component of water potential that consists of the physical pressure on a solution, which can be positive, negative, or zero
- when a solution is being withdrawn by a syringe is under negative pressure
- when it is being expelled it is under positive pressure
Protoplast
The living part of a plant cell, which also includes the plasma membrane
Turgor Pressure
The force directed against a plant cell wall after the influx of water and swelling of cell due to osmosis
Aquaporin
A channel protein in a cellular membrane that specifically facilitates osmosis
Bulk flow
The movement of fluid to a difference in presure between two locations. This is independent of solute concentration
Occurs in the vascular tissue
Long distance transport
Endodermis
In plant roots, the innermost layer of the cortex that surrounds the vascular cylinder. Functions as a final checkpoint for the selective passage of materials from the cortex into the vascular cylinder
Casparian Strip
A water-impermeable wing of wax in the endoermal cells of plants that blocks the passive flow of water and solutes into the stele by way of cell walls.
This means that the water and minerals must cross the selectively permeable plasma membrane of an endodermal cell
Transport of water and minerals into the xylem
Water and minerals in the root cortex must enter the xylem of the vascular cylinder. They go through endodermal cells which discharge them for their protoplast to their cell wall through diffusion and active transport. The water and minerals can then be transported to tracheid and then to the shoot system.
Xylem Sap
The dilute solution of water and minerals carried through vessels and tracheids. It is transported through bulk flow to the veins that branch through each leaf.
Transpiration
the evaporative loss of water from a plant
Air outside the leaf has a lower water potential than the air inside the leaf so water vapor inside the leaf diffuses and exits via the stomata. This creates tension and pulls teh xylem sap up to the leaves
Root Pressure
Pressure exterted in the root of plants as the result of osmosis, causing exudation from cut stems and guttation of water from leaves
Guttation
The exudation of water droplets from leaves caused by root pressure in certain plants
Cohesion Tension Hypothesis
Transpiration exerts pull on xylem sap, putting the sap under negative pressure, or tension, and that the cohesion of water molceules transmits this pull along the entire length of the xylem from shoots to roots.
Role of Stomata in Regulating transpiration
By opening and closing stomata, gaurd cells balance the plant’s requirement to conserve water with its requirement for photosynthesis.
Stimuli for stomatal opening and closing
- light
- depletion of CO2
- Internal Clock
- Drought Stress