http://brianmccauley.

net/bio6a/bio-6a-lab/plants/leaves
Plant Lab Review
This review applies to Plants I, II, III.
The objectives of the Bio 6A plant labs overlap, and on the lab exam I will ask you to compare and
contrast specimens that you looked at on different days. The things you see in Plants III may help
clarify the significance ot the things you saw in Plants I. For that reason, I'm giving you a single page
of review questions covering all the plant labs. I am dividing the review into section for the separate
labs, but you should keep in mind that they will overlap.

About the lab exam

It will be hard. Many students struggle to get passing scores. On the other hand, I am telling you
more or less exactly what will be on the exam, so if you pay attention in lab and read these pages
carefully, you can get a very high score (for reference, the scores on last year's first Lab Exam
ranged from 38% to 99%.)
I usually base the lab exam on stations. A station is a place where you can sit (or stand) and look at
a specimen. While you're at that station, you can answer some questions about the specimen. I
won't ask you questions like "What is this?" and the answer will be "pine cone." Instead, I might
show you a pine cone and ask if the plant that produced it was a vascular plant or if it contains
triploid endosperm. Or maybe, "does this plant require water to carry its sperm for fertilization?" To
do well, you'll need to be familiar with the specimens in lab, the concepts presented, and the
connections between them.

Plants I: The Evolution of Land Plants

Vocabulary review
You should be familiar with these terms; be able to recognize the structures and say which groups
have them.

alternation of generations

angiosperm

chlorophyta

chloroplast

cuticle

diploid

embryo

gamete

gametophyte

green algae

gymnosperm

haploid

lignified vascular tissue

meiosis

meristem

mitosis

pollen

seed

spore

sporophyte

syngamy

viridiplantae

zygote

Review questions
Some of these questions, and other similar questions, will be on the lab exam. You dont need to turn
in answers to these questions now. However, if you can give good answers to all of them, you will do
very well on the lab exam..

1.

How is the overall structure of a moss different from that of aquatic algae? How is this
morphological difference related to living on land vs. living in the water?

2.

How is the overall structure of a moss different from that of vascular plants? How is this
morphological difference related to the plants' sizes and environments?

3.

How is a moss leaf (not considered a true leaf) similar to a flowering plants leaf? How is it
different? (You'll need to refer to Plants II for this.)

4.

How is a moss rhizoid similar to a flowering plants root? How is it different?

5.

How does water get from the ground to the upper part of a moss?

6.

When youre looking at a moss, whats haploid? Whats diploid?

7.

Which life cycle stage is bigger and longer-lived in mosses sporophyte or gametophyte? Is
this stage haploid or diploid?

8.

Is water necessary for fertilization in mosses? Why or why not?

9.

Is water necessary for fertilization in ferns? Why or why not?

10.

Is water necessary for fertilization in gymnosperms? Why or why not?

11.

Is water necessary for fertilization in angiosperms? Why or why not?

12.

Which life cycle stage is bigger and longer-lived in ferns sporophyte or gametophyte? Is
this stage haploid or diploid?

13.

Which life cycle stage is bigger and longer-lived in gymnosperms sporophyte or

gametophyte? Is this stage haploid or diploid?

14.

Which life cycle stage is bigger and longer-lived in angiosperms sporophyte or

gametophyte? Is this stage haploid or diploid?

15.

What is the function of flowers?

16.

What is the function of pollen?

17.

How would you draw the life cycle diagram for a single-celled protist like Amoeba proteus?
Does this organism show alternation of generations?

18.

How are the life cycles of mosses and ferns similar? How are they different?

19.

How are fern spores similar to angiosperm seeds? How are they different?

20.

How are fern spores similar to angiosperm pollen? How are they different?

21.

Which of the following are clades? Plants, vascular plants, nonvascular plants, vascular seed
plants, vascular non-seed plants.

22.

Draw a cladogram showing flowering plants, gymnosperms, ferns, mosses, and green algae.
Indicate where on the cladogram you would find the following characteristics:

alternation of generations

apical meristem

chloroplasts

dependent embryo

flowers

lignified vascular tissue

multicellular

pollen

seeds

sexual reproduction

spore

Plants II: Vascular Plant Structure and Growth

Vocabulary review
Don't simply focus on the definitions of these terms. On the lab exam, I will ask you to recognize
these things in specimens, to say which groups of plants have them, and explain what they do.

Apical meristem

Cork cambium

Cuticle

Dermal tissue

Dicot (recognize leaves, stems, roots)

Endodermis

Epidermis

Fibrous roots

Ground tissue

Guard cell

Heartwood

Lateral meristem

Leaf

Mesophyll

Monocot (recognize leaves, stems, roots)

Phloem

Primary or secondary phloem

Primary or secondary xylem

Root

Sapwood

Stem

Stoma

Tap roots

Vascular cambium

Vascular tissue

Xylem

Other important concepts

Secondary growth

Primary growth

Cell proliferation

Differentiation

Determinate vs. indeterminate growth

Haploid vs. diploid

Meristematic growth

Vascular plants vs. nonvascular

Concept questions
1.

Identify dermal, ground, and vascular tissues in leaves, stems, and roots. What is the
function of each of these tissue systems in each type of organ?

2.

Can you find primary and secondary growth in leaves, stems, and roots?

3.

Where would you find meristematic tissue in a typical stem?

4.

What kind of tissues are generated by apical meristems?

5.

How is xylem different from phloem?

6.

Why do roots have xylem and phloem?

7.

Why do leaves have xylem and phloem?

8.

Do mosses have stomata? If so, where are they? If not, how do they survive without them?

9.

Of the features discussed in this lab, which ones would be present in mosses? Which ones
would be present in ferns?

Plants vs. animals

You won't see these questions on the next test; you may only be able to answer them clearly after
you do the labs covering animals.
1.

Do you think humans have anything equivalent to meristems?

2.

Your bones grow thicker as you grow up, but you don't have anything like the rings of a tree
trunk. Why not?

3.

Why are plants different from animals? You should be able to answer this in terms of cell
structure, mechanisms of development, and ecology. You should also be able to explain how
those different kinds of answers are connected.

Plants III: Seed Plant Reproduction

There are a lot of details to remember, but keep in mind that all of this material is about one basic
idea: the life cycles of seed plants have evolved in ways that make it possible for these plants to
reproduce on dry land -- unlike their algal ancestors, which lived and reproduced only in water.

Concept Questions
1.

Compare and contrast green algae, mosses, ferns, gymnosperms, and angiosperms in
terms of: gametophytes, gametes, sporophytes, spores.

2.

Draw a cladogram showing green algae, mosses, ferns, gymnosperms, and angiosperms.
Show where chloroplasts, flowers, fruits, pollen, vascular tissue, seeds, and alternation of
generation fit on your cladogram.

3.

How can ferns get dispersed to new locations? How can mosses get dispersed to new
locations? How can angiosperms and gymnosperms get dispersed to new locations? Why does
dispersal matter for plants?

4.

What advantages do angiosperms have over mosses? If angiosperms have advantages,

why are there still mosses? (You could ask the same question comparing angiosperms and
gymnosperms.)

Structures, processes, & specimens

Youve now done three plant labs. You should be ready to recognize and understand the following in
any of the specimens youve seen:

Angiosperm

Anther

Apical & lateral meristems

Carpel

Dermal, ground, & vascular tissues

Double fertilization

Embryo

Endosperm

Epidermis

Fertilization: where it occurs, what it produces

Filament

Flower

Fruit

Gametes (eggs & sperm)

Gametophyte

Guard cells

Gymnosperm

Haploid vs. diploid vs. triploid

Meiosis: where it occurs, what it produces

Mesophyll

Mitosis: where it occurs, what it produces

Monocots & dicots

Nonvascular plant

Ovary

Petal

Phloem

Pollen

Primary & secondary growth

Prokaryote

Protist

Seed

Sepal

Spore

Sporophyte

Stamen

Stigma

Stomata

Vascular non-seed plant

Vascular seed plant

Xylem

Zygote

There is a lot of vocabulary for this exam, but it's not primarily a vocabulary test, but keep in mind
that it's not primarily a vocabulary test; it's about plants. Rather than simply defining the terms
above, you should be asking yourself questions about them, such as:

Which specimens did I see that have pollen?

What doess the pollen do?

If the pollen does something important, how can some plants survive without it?

Additional sample questions

You'll see some concept questions, such as those on this page, that can be answered without
looking at a specimen. You'll also see a number of questions for which you're asked to look at a
particular specimen and answer questions about it. The specimen could be anything similar to what
was shown in lab, whether a microscope slide or a larger specimen. Some of the questions may ask
you about some structure that you can't see, but which might be present at some other stage in the
life cycle. Here are some examples:
1.

Does this plant species require water to carry its sperm for fertilization?

2.

Is this structure (indicated by a pointer in the microscope) haploid, diploid, triploid, or

heterokaryotic?

3.

Was this structure produced by primary or secondary growth? By an apical or a lateral

meristem?

4.

Does this plant species produce seeds? Pollen? Spores?

5.

Is this a gametophyte or a sporophyte?

6.

What is this tissue or structure? (Could be anything listed in the plant lab vocabulary.)

7.

How many stamens/stigmas/petals does this flower have?

8.

What does this structure produce? (Spores, gametes, seeds, pollen, etc.)

9.

Is an apical meristem visible anywhere in this slide? A lateral meristem?

10.

Draw a simple diagram of the life cycle of this plant and indicate on your picture which part is
shown in the microscope.

Also, don't forget that this review is only for plants, fungi will also be on lab exam 1. Other activities
that you did in lab, such as scientific method, systematics, and gas exchange, won't be on the lab
exam.