plant cloning

Question 1

what is micropopagation-

Answer 1

growing large numbers of new plants from meristem tissue taken from a sample plant

Question 2

what is tissue culture

Answer 2

grow new tissues, organs, plants from certain tissues cut from a sample plant

Question 3

what is the easist way to create plant clones

Answer 3

cuttings

Question 4

what is a cutting

Answer 4

when you cut a stem between two nodes,
place cut end in moist soil
and new roots grow from tissue in stem.

Question 5

what can be added to a cutting for plants that don’t root easily

Answer 5

plant rooting hormones can be added to cut stems to stimulate root growth

Question 6

how can cuttings produce large plant numbers

Answer 6

root cuttings
or leaf cuttings

Question 7

what is tissue culture

Answer 7

when you grow new plants or tissue from certain tissues of a sample plant

Question 8

where is tissue culture carried out

Answer 8

in a nutrient medium

Question 9

what is a common nutrient medium

Answer 9

agar plate

Question 10

what tissue is used in micropropagation and why

Answer 10

meristem tissue, stem cell and it is free from virus infection

Question 11

what process is tissue culture used in

Answer 11

micropropagation

Question 12

what is an explant

Answer 12

explant is the plant which is selected and cut in micropropagation

Question 13

why is it important to sterilise explants

Answer 13

to kill bacteria
bacteria would grow in conditions which plants grow in therefore it is crucial to get rid

Question 14

what nutrients are present in the agar gel

Answer 14

plant nutrients ,plant growth substances such as auxin and cytokinin

Question 15

what do auxin and cytokinin do

Answer 15

auxin- cell elongation in shoots

cytokinin- promotes cell division in roots

Question 16

when meristem is placed in an agar nutrient medium, what is formed

Answer 16

a callus

Question 17

what is a callus

Answer 17

a mass of totipotent, undifferentiated cells

Question 18

in micropropagation, what happens to the callus

Answer 18

callus is divided to produce a large number of small cell clumps. they then divide and differentiate into different plant tissue due to different growth mediums

Question 19

is micropropagation, small clumps of callus are moved to different growth mediums. describe

Answer 19

they all contain differnt concentrations of different growth hormones.
e.g. more auxin stimulate more shoot growth, more cytokinin stimulates more root growth.

Question 20

what is the last step of micropropagation

Answer 20

moving plantlets to a green house to be grown in compost or soil, and acclimatised to normal growth conditions

Question 21

what are the advantages of artificial plant cloning

Answer 21

rapid
replaces sexual reproduction
plants selected are all genetically identical to parent, same desired characteristics

Question 22

all plants produced from micropropagation are all identical to …

Answer 22

eachother and parent

Question 23

what are the disadvantages of artificial cloning

Answer 23

• tissue culture is labour intensive
• expensive
  -reduce genetic diversity and plants are more susceptible to disease
  no genetic variation

Question 24

what does totipotent mean

Answer 24

stem cells which can differentiate into ANY cell type found in an embryo and extra embryonic cells

e.g. a zygote is totipotent, formed when sperm fertilises egg.

Question 25

what is pluripotency

Answer 25

embryonic stem cells which can differentiate into ANY cell type found in an embryo but CANT differentiate into extra-embryonic cells.

Question 26

what are multipotent cells

Answer 26

adult specialised stem cells which can only differentiate into a limited amount of cells

Question 27

what are extra embryonic cells

Answer 27

cells which make up the placenta

Question 28

what are the limited range of stem cells a multipotent cell can differentiate into

Answer 28

digestive tissue
nervous tissue
cardiac tissue