Welcome to an overview of what Economic Botany has to offer.
It will be a distance learning course this spring 2000, so below are highlights of what I plan
to be doing in the TopClass format
LECTURE 1 HIGHLIGHTS FOR BIOLOGY 03074, ECONOMIC BOTANY:
REVIEW OF VEGETATIVE PLANT STRUCTURE; FUNGI; CHEMISTRY
Text: 2nd ed.: Chs. 1-4, 22 (pp. 371-386); 1st ed.: Chs. 1-4, 22 (pp. 340-354)
possible web site: http://www.botany.org (Botanical Society of America homepage; many links)
VEGETATIVE PLANT ORGANS: three main organs of stems, leaves, and roots.
stem: conduction of materials and support of the plant, e.g., undeground potato tuber
root: (typically) the underground portion of the plant, involved in anchorage, absorption, conduction, and storage, e.g., carrot taproot
leaf: photosythetic surface, e.g., blade of spinach
PLANT TISSUES: tissue: a group of similar cells specialized for the purpose of a common function. There are three plant tissue systems: a) ground or fundamental tissue; b) vascular; and c) dermal.
A. Ground tissue system consists of all tissues of plants other than those in the vascular or dermal systems
A1. parenchyma cells: totipotent (capable of cell division), usually with only primary cell walls.
A2. collenchyma cells: elongated and unevenly thickened (makes up the"strings" of celery.
A3. schlerenchyma cells: hardened with lignin, a tough phenol polymer.
B. Vascular tissue system consists of the vascular tissues xylem and phloem
B1. xylem: principal water-conducting material..
B2. phloem: principal food-conducting material.
C. Dermal tissue system consists of the epidermis and periderm.
C1. epidermis: outermost layer of entire primary plant body
C2. periderm: often replaces epidermis in stems and roots with secondary growth
FUNGI: eukaryotic, cell-walled (containing chitin) organisms that absorb food from other sources. Fungi are made of hyphae massed into a mycelium. They reproduce by giving off spores. Typically, the visible part of the fungus is the fruiting body
MAJOR ASPECTS OF PLANT CHEMISTRY: Water #1 molecule, making up most of the plant cell. Water is polar and has lots of hydrogen bonds (adhesion and cohesion). Organic molecules contain the element carbon, inorganic molecules do not.
Carbohydrates contain carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen in a 1:2:1 ratio. Types of carbohydrates include polysaccharides (starch and cellulose, differing by the linkages among many glucose sugars).
Lipids are nonpolar, are also made of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, but with fewer oxygens. Fats contain a glycerol and fatty acids off of that. Phospholipids are important in cell membranes. They have a polar (charged) phosphate end and a nonpolar (uncharged) lipid end.
Proteins in plants tend to be concentrated in seeds. Proteins are made up units called amino acids. Enzymes are protein catalysts .
SECONDARY METABOLITES include plant alkaloids: plant products made of nitrogen-containing ring compounds that show activity in vertebrates, e.g., caffeine, nicotine.
|main page| |background| |03028: Physiology| |03048: Anatomy|
|03050: Invertebrate Zoology| |03051: Vertebrate Zoology| |03074: Economic Botany|
Please send comments and questions to: cronewil@hvcc.edu
Copyright 1999 by Wilson Crone
External and unofficial links are not endorsed by Hudson Valley Community College
This page updated on October 4, 1999