植物生理学——exam3.docVIP

Plant Physiology - Exam 3 April 17, 2006 – 100 points total. Please write neatly – it could help your grade. 1. Imagine that you could inject leaf cells with something to regulate the partitioning of triose-phosphates between starch and sucrose. What might you inject, where would you inject it, and what would be the effect? (6) The key here is to understand that cytosolic Pi levels regulate the rate of triose-P export from the chloroplast. Higher cytosolic Pi means causes higher triose-P export. So, if you injected Pi into the cytosol, you would expect more triose-P export, more sucrose synthesis, and less starch synthesis. 2. In the figure below, fill in realistic values for the given components of water potential in the phloem and xylem at the two ends of the flow paths illustrated. Your values should makes sense in terms of the mechanism of water movement within and between the xylem and phloem. Which process – xylem or phloem transport – is dependent on metabolic energy? Explain. (10). See text for example. Explain how and why leaf-level water use efficiency should be affected by rising CO2 levels in C3 and C4 plants. Include in your explanation how WUE differs between C3 and C4 plants currently and how that difference would change in a future, higher-CO2 world. (6) Water use efficiency (WUE) is higher in C4 than C3 because the CO2 concentrating mechanism of C4 allows higher photosynthesis and lower stomatal conductance and transpiration. As CO2 rises, the photosynthesis of C4 plants will not be stimulated because it’s already saturated at current CO2 levels, while the photosynthesis of C3 plants will increase. High CO2 also causes a reduction in stomatal conductance, so this will reduce transpiration. The combination of higher photosynthesis and lower transpiration will increase WUE more in C3 than C4 as CO2 rises. Use the graph below to illustrate the difference in the light response curves of sun and shade leaves. Be sure to