# 1APH Chapter 9 Flowers and Reproduction

1. Reproduction can serve two very different functions. What are they?

2. Under what conditions is it selectively advantageous for a plant to produce offspring identical to itself?

3. Imagine a plant that has been well adapted to a particular habitat, and it has been reproducing only asexually; thus all of its offspring are identical to it. If the climate or other conditions change such that the plant can no longer survive in the new conditions, what will happen to all of its offspring? Why?

4. With asexual production, are progeny ever more fit, more adapted than the parent?

5. Look at the apples in Figure 9-1a, all growing on a single tree. Do all of the seeds in all of the apples in the photograph have the same maternal parent? Do they all have the same paternal parent?

6. Sexual reproduction produces offspring that are not identical to each other or to either parent. Usually, some are more well adapted than the parents. Some are more poorly adapted, and most are about as adapted. What is one of the beneficial aspects of this diversity?

7. In stable populations, ones that are neither increasing nor decreasing in abundance (e.g., there are million trees now and there will be a million trees a thousand years from now), about how many of a plants seeds survive and grow to adulthood, being able to replace it when it dies? If during the plants lifetime it produces 100,000 seeds, how many do not survive, do not grow, and cannot replace it when it dies. (Hint: do not think of humans, as we are an increasing population, not a stable one. Almost all our children survive, but that is not true of any other species.)

8. Describe the life cycle of us humans. Are the tissues and organs made up of diploid cells or haploid ones? Our reproductive organs make sperm cells in males and egg cells in females. Is this done by mitosis or meiosis? When our bodies make gametes, does every cell in our body become a sperm cell or egg cell, or do just some of the cells in our reproductive organs do this? Can our haploid sperm and egg cells undergo mitosis and grow into new animals that look like us but are haploid instead? (Haploid eggs do grow in bees. They develop into males.) After a fertilized egg (a zygote) is formed, is it diploid or haploid? Can it immediately undergo meiosis to make four new sperm cells or egg cells, or can it only grow by mitosis into another person?

9. The plants we are familiar with are called sporophytes or the sporophyte generation. Do these plants have bodies made up of diploid cells or haploid ones? In which organs does meiosis occur (two are correct) - leaves, stems, stamens, roots, carpels, or petals. When plants undergo meiosis, do all cells of the plant undergo meiosis? Do all cells become haploid, or does meiosis occur in just few cells in some flower parts?

10. In animals, meiosis produces gametes (sperm cells and egg cells), but that doesnt happen in plants. When some of the cells of a sporophyte undergo meiosis, what types of cells are produced? What do they grow into?

11. What is the gametophyte? How many different types of gametophytes are there in a plant life cycle? What do they look like (Hint: see Figure 9-5b)? Do the sporophytes and gametophytes of seed plants ever look like each other?

12. Draw and label a microgametophyte of a flowering plant. What type of gamete does it produce? Draw and label a megagametophyte of a flowering plant. What type of gamete does it produce?

13. Flowers typically have many parts, although some flowers can be missing some of the standard parts. What is the name of each of the following parts: a. The stalk of the flower b. The end of the stalk, where the other parts are attached c. The parts that are usually green and protect the flower bud as it develops d. The parts that attract the pollinators e. The parts that produce pollen f. The parts that receive pollen and which contain ovules 14. If a flower has all the parts c, d, e, and f in Question 13, they are said to be _______________ flowers. If they are missing any of these parts, they are said to be _______________ flowers. Parts e and f are especially important because they produce the reproductive cells, the spores. If a flower has both e and f in Question 13, they are __________________ flowers. If they are missing either e or f or both, they are _______________ flowers. 15. In flowers that are pollinated by wind or water, which of the parts in Question 13 is often missing?

16. What is the difference between a perfect and an imperfect flower? What is the difference between complete and an incomplete flower?

17. A stamen usually has two parts. The stalk is called a ________________ and an upper portion, the ____________, which produces the pollen. Only some of the cells in the upper part undergo meiosis and become pollen grains (microspores). Those cells are called _________________ mother cells or ______________. Neighboring anther cells, in a layer called the ______________, act as nurse cells. 18. Carpels usually have three parts: a ____________ that catches pollen grains, a _____________ that elevates the first part, and an ________________ where megaspores are produced. In this last part, there are placentae that bear small structures called _______________ each with a short stalk called a funiculus and a central mass of parenchyma called the nucellus. One cell in the nucellus will be the ______________ mother cell or ______________. 19. The megaspore in most flowering plants grows into a megagametophyte that has seven cells and eight nuclei. Name and describe the seven cells.

20. After the pollen lands on the stigma, it is far away from the ovule with the megagametophyte, which holds the egg (the megagamete). How are the two sperm cells transported from the stigma to the egg?

21. In angiosperms, as a sperm cell enters the egg, it loses both _________________________ and _______________________ such that only the sperm cell nucleus contributes any DNA to the new zygote. In gymnosperms, however, the sperm cell loses only its ________________________ such that the zygote inherits both plastids and a nucleus from the sperm cell. 22. After the sperm cells enter a synergid, one fertilizes the egg in a two-step process. First there is fusion of the sperm cells protoplasm with that of the egg, a step called ______________________. Then the sperm cell nucleus fuses with the egg nucleus, the second step, called _______________. 23. What happens to the second sperm nucleus, the one that does not fertilize the egg cell? What is the tissue that develops from this second fertilization? How is coconut related to this?

24. In most eudicot seeds, the parts of the embryo are very easy to see. Describe each of these parts: a. Cotyledons b. Radicle c. Hypocotyl d. Epicotyl e. Extra credit portion: Of you have already studied Chapter 7: Roots, you have read about the radicle (page 144) with regard to a taproot system and a fibrous system. How is the radicle involved in these types of root systems?

25. What are albuminous and exalbuminous seeds? Consider corn, peas, and beans. Which of these seed are which?

26. After pollination and fertilization, as the ovule develops into a seed, the ovary matures into a _________________. Many of these have three parts. The ________________ is the the skin or peel. The ___________________ is the flesh, and the innermost layer, the _______________, may be tough like the pit of a cherry. 27. What is the difference between self-pollination and cross-pollination? If pollen is transferred from the stamens of a flower to the stigma of the very same flower, is that cross-pollination or selfpollination? If it is transferred from the stamen of one flower to the stigma of another flower on the very same plant?If it is transferred from the stamen of one flower to the stigma of another flower on a different plant, but a plant that is a clone of the first one? Animals do not have pollen, of course, but why is it that most animals never have to worry about the equivalent problem of selffertilization? Why cannot most animals fertilize themselves?

28.

Describe a species that is dioecious. Name several samples (Hint: See Figure 9-6). In order for sexual reproduction to occur in a dioecious species, how many separate plants must be involved? Name them all.

29.

Describe a monoecious species. Name several samples.

30.

In several pairs of plant and animal species, plant have become such that only its animalpartner can pollinate it, and the animals have become modified such that they are especially well adapted to pollinate it just their plant partner. What is the name of this type of evolution that resuits in two organisms becoming particularly adapted to and dependent on each other?

31.

Explain the following terms: inferior ovary, superior ovary, actinomorphic flower, zygomorphic flower. How is each of these modificaitions selectively advantageous?

32.

What is an inflorescence? The inflorescences of a sausage tree (Figure 9-29) hang far down of the tree. How is this of benefit to bats? Why can the inflorescence of Combretum (Figure 9-30b) attract more pollinators than can the individuals flowers?

33.

After pollination and then fertilization, what usually happened to each of the following: stigma, style, carpel, ovule, integuments and zygote?

34.

Fruits are often classified as dry or fleshy. What is the difference? Which of these two are dehiscent, which are indehiscent?

35.

In ordinary English, we use the word fruit to mean something sweet and juicy; however, the following things are fruits: peanut shells, pea pods, bell peppers, and chilli peppers. What is the characteristic that let us know these really are fruits even enough they are not sweet? In contrast, bananas are fruits that do not have this characteristics (they are sterile and new plants must be grown from buds that sprout near the base of the plant).

36.

Some things that we call fruits are not true fruits but instead are accessory (false) fruits. What is the red part of a strawberry, and what are the true strawberry fruits (Hint: see Figure 9-32a)? In an apple, what is the fleshy part that we eat and what is the core that we throw away?