19 February 2008

Life Science

Fungi (con’t)
Histoplasmosis- found in the manure of bats and birds. This is a systemic fungus
and can be quite serious when a human is infected by it. After a histoplasmosis
scare, the area was tested by a microbiologist and it was discovered that the
concentration of histoplasmosis was greatest where people walked on a frequent
basis. Later, it was discovered that most people in the south are exposed to
histoplasmosis on an early and frequent basis, so they tend to be more resistant to
illness from it than others.
Plants
-Multicellular photosynthetic autotrophs (some meat-eating and parasitic plants
exist)
-Approximately 280,000 species of plants
-Range in size from 1mm to over 100m.
-Smallest flowering plant- Duckweed
-Largest plant- Eucalyptus and Redwood trees

-Most plants are vascular- They have vascular tissue (xylem and phloem). This
enables plants to grow tall. Vascular plants have well-developed roots and well
developed leaves.

-16,000 species of non-vascular plants

-Plants that are not vascular cannot grow tall.
-Bryophytes- non-vascular land plants
-mosses
-most common of bryophytes
-sperm must swim to eggs
-found in damp or moist habitat for at least part of the time
-follow lichens in succession and are the first step in
secondary succession
-Some mosses can release spores that get blown on the
wind.
-There are some parts of the world where mosses are the
climax vegetation, such as Ireland, and the British Isles.
-compacted moss (peat) that has died can be cut out in
blocks and used for fuel or as a building material.
-hornworts
-liverworts
-wort = German word for plant

Trends among plants

-Plants have a long evolutionary history.
-Multicellular green algae-700 million years ago
-Simple stalk plants on land-300 million years ago
-Extensive forests of vascular plants (tall, woody ferns)-245 million years
ago
Seedless Vascular Plants
Horsetails
Lychophyte
Ferns
-adapted to living on land
-usually live in wet, humid regions because sperm must be able to
swim
-12,000 species of ferns
-temperate or tropical regions
-range in size from 4” to 50’

sorus

frond

The sorus will produce spores and the spores will drop on the
ground by the millions. Spores germinate into heart-shaped
structures (gametophyte-n).

The Seed Plants

-have a seed
-most successful in terms of numbers and distribution
-the seed enables them to be distributed world-wide
-the seed contains the embryo
-enables them to reproduce away from water

Gymnosperms (from naked seed in Greek)

-usually found in drier biomes such as the taiga or Northern
Coniferous forest
-The first seed plants
-seed not packaged in a fruit
-700 species
-550 of these species are Conifers (seed cones)
-pine, fir (friendly fir-the needles are soft), spruce,
hemlock, cedar, cypress, redwoods, juniper
-these are pollinated by wind, so they produce lots
of pollen and they are usually found close together.
-Pines produce male and female cones, cones must
drop and strike one another to create embryos
-150 are either Cycads or Ginkgos
Angiosperms (vessel seed)
-235,000 species
-have flowers so they can trick an insect into pollinating the
species