Plumpton: Soil Flashcards
What is plantae?
A kingdom which contains all plants.
Why do plants require heat?
Because they cannot generate it on their own. They need it for enzymes to function.
What percentage of water do plants “use”?
4-5%. The rest is used to get water and nutrients to where they need to be.
What’s more important to plants: water or nutrients?
Water. Without it, nothing can get to where it needs to be within the plant.
Do chalky soils have a high or low pH?
They have a high pH (they’re alkaline).
What is exosmosis?
Osmosis, but where the solvent (water) moves from a high solute concentration to a low solute concentraion.
What is tonicity (two ways of defining it)?
- The concentration of solute within a solvent.
- The capacity of a cell to gain or lose water.
What influences the rate of osmosis?
The difference in tonicity between two fluids (if the difference is high, then the rate of osmosis will be fast).
What does it mean if something is hypotonic? What about hypertonic?
- Hypotonic: a solvent has a low tonicity/concentration of solutes.
- Hypertonic: a solvent has a high tonicity/concentration of solutes.
What does it mean if conditions are isotonic?
That there’s a balanced concentration of solutes between extra and intracellular environments.
What does cytoplasmic mean?
It means that something relates to the interior of a cell.
What does semi-permeable mean?
It means that some things can pass through a membrane, while other things can’t.
Osmosis is all about probability. Why?
Less solutes = more open pores = more likely water molecules will pass through a membrane.
When water enters a plant cell, it pushes against the cell membrane (which pushes against the cell wall). What does this create?
Turgor pressure (and turgidity).
The cell wall stops the plant from obtaining too much…
Water!
What happens when a plant grows in a hypertonic environment?
Water gets removed from cells via osmosis. Cells then shrink and lose turgor pressure.
When a plant cell loses water and turgid pressure, what is said to occur?
Plasmolysis!
How can a plant’s environment become (relatively) hypertonic?
If the plant itself cannot obtain/retain enough water.
Isotonic environments are very rare in nature. What happens if plants do grow in one?
Turgor pressure is slightly reduced and cells become flaccid.
What is water potential?
It’s a measure of free-moving water molecules within a solvent. The less solutes dissolved in a solvent, the higher the water potential is.
What is the process by which plants shed they’re leaves, flowers, and/or fruits?
Abscission
What is aeration?
The process of introducing air into the soil to promote the growth of healthy plant roots.
What’s alkalinity? Why is it important?
A measure of the ability of a solution to neutralize acids, important in determining soil pH and nutrient availability.
What’s anaerobic respiration?
Respiration that occurs without oxygen, producing less energy and resulting in by-products like ethanol or lactic acid.
What’s an angiosperm?
A flowering plant that produces seeds enclosed within a fruit.
What’s an anther?
The part of a stamen that contains the pollen.
What’s a biennial?
A plant that completes its life cycle in two years, typically flowering and fruiting in the second year.
What’s biological weathering?
The process by which living organisms, such as plants and microbes, break down rocks and minerals, contributing to soil formation.
What are bryophytes?
Non-vascular plants, such as mosses and liverworts.
What’s bulk density? What three things does it influence?
Bulk density is the mass of soil per unit volume, which affects root penetration, water movement, and aeration.
What does a water molecule look like? What are the charges on the oxygen and hydrogen atoms?
What do multiple water molecules look like?
Why does ice float?
When water freezes, it forms a crystalline structure where each hydrogen atoms bonds to four other water molecules. This causes water/ice to expand/become less dense.
What happens to water when it’s at 3.98 degrees celcius?
When water is 3.98 degrees Celsius its density exceeds that at higher or lower temperatures. In other words, it becomes heavier than water at freezing point.
Water has the highest known surface tension of any known liquid. True or false?
True!
What facilitates surface tension?
Hydrogen bonding.
What enables capillary action?
Water’s very high surface tension.
What allows things to float on water?
The surface tension of water.
Water has very high solvent power. What does this mean? (3 Points)
- More things can dissolve in it than anything else. It is referred to as a universal solvent.
- This is because water’s polarity allows it to attract other polar molecules, like glucose.
- It’s also why oil won’t mix because it’s not polar.
What are the three parts of a diagram that you need to know?
