PLB PLANT BIOLOGY

INTRODUCTION TO CELL

Cell: the study of cell in terms of structure, function and chemistry is

called cytology
In 1591, a Dutch merchant called Anton Leeuwenhoek invented single
lens microscope with which he observed tiny moving creature in a body of
water which he referred to as animal cell. The invention of microscope led to
the discovery of cell.
In 1665, an English scientist, Robert Hooke observed that the cork layer of
wood consists of several compartments which he termed cells. He observed a
multitude of pores that look like wall compartments of the honey comb which
he believed consisted of dark regions of non-living material.
In 1838, a German botanist, Matthias Schleiden was the first to clearly
state that a living thing is made up of cells.
In 1839, a zoologist, Theodor Schwann was the first to clearly state that
animals consist of cells.
In 1855, Rudolf Virchow identified the nucleus and postulated that the
nucleus control and coordinate the activities of a cell. The observation of these
researchers led to the development of cell theory.
CELL THEORY
1. All living things are made up of cells
2. The cell is the smallest and fundamental unit of life
3. All cells arise from pre-existing cells
4. Cell contains genetic materials which are passed from generation to
generation by cell division.
5. All cells have a similar chemical composition e.g. protein, nucleic acid,
carbohydrate and lipid.
6. The metabolic process associated with life occurs within the cells.
Cell is the functional, structural and fundamental unit of a living organism.
TYPES OR CLASSIFICATION
There are two major categories of cell. They are:
Prokaryotic and Eukaryotic cell
The main difference between these two categories is that prokaryotic cells
do not have a nuclear membrane. Its nucleic material consists of a single
chromosome and it lies in the cytoplasm.
In prokaryotic cell, membrane consist of organelles
Eukaryotic cells on the other hand include all other such as the protista,
fungi, plants and animal. The nucleus in the eukaryotic cell is surrounded by a
nuclear envelope and contains nucleoplasm. The cytoplasm found in the
nuclear membrane and the nucleus consists of fluid and organelles.
CELL SIZES AND SHAPES
 Cells can be remarkably different in sizes, shapes and function. Some cells
are visible e.g. eggs of birds. However, most cells are microscopic. The size of
the cell is measured in micrometer (um). E.g. bacteria cell range from 0.22 -0.3
um
Liver cells are about 20 um and plant cell could be greater than 40um.
Cells also come in different shape. Egg. Spindle shape, aster shape, and oval
shape, spherical and cylindrical shape. Some cells change their shape. E.g.
Amoeba, micro-phaets, others have typical shape. E.g. spermatozoa and
epidermal cells. The shapes of the cells are evolved to help them carry out
specific functions

CELL STRUCTURE
Despite that, there are many different types of cells different shapes and
sizes. The concept of generalized is adopted. These include features from all
kinds of cell and are basically divided into three parts.
1. Cell membrane: A selective barrier which encloses the cell.
2. Cytoplasm: It separates the plasma membrane and the nucleus
3. Nucleus: It contains the genetic material of a fine network of thread called
chromatids which is DNA associated with particular protein. At the time of cell
division, this chromatid becomes shortened to form chromosomes.
CELL MEMBRANE
This membranous layer that encloses the cell. It separates the materials
outside the cell (extra cellular) from the materials inside the cell (intracellular).
It defines cell boundaries. It maintains cell integrity. It regulates exchange of
material between the cytoplasm and extracellular fluid due to selective
permeability. It is important in intercellular communication and cell identity.
STRUCTURE OF CELL MEMBRANE
Cell membrane is made of phospholipids bilayer comprising of
phospholipids, glycolipid and cholesterol. In addition to membrane protein. Cell
membrane may be hydrophilic or hydrophobic.
CYTOPLASM
It is the jelly-like fluid in the cell. It is the medium of chemical reaction. It
provides platform upon which other organelles can operate within the functions
of cell such as expansion, growth and replication are carried out in the
cytoplasm. It comprises the cytosome and all the organelles excluding the
nucleus and cytoskeleton.
CYTOSOME
These are little organelles suspended in the cytoplasm. Each organelle
has specific shape and metabolic tasks. Some are surrounded by two
envelopes and a large number have a single envelope
MITOCHONDRION
 They could be cylindrical, broad shaped or spherical usually about 8um
long. It is the centre of aerobic respiration in eukaryotic cells. It is a double
membrane bounded organelle. The outer membrane is smooth and it’s
permeable while the inner membrane is highly folded into crista with a large
surface area. The space enclosed within the crista forms a matrix which
contains circular DNA called mtDNA. The inner membrane is the site for ATP
synthesis.
ENDOPLASMIC RETICULUM
This is a system of flattened cavity (cisternae) which is lying in the
membrane. It is the site of synthesis of many substances. Its cavity also
functions as transporting system whereby substances can be moved to other
parts of the cells. There are two types
1. RER: It contains numerous ribosomes on the outer surface. The ribosome
synthesis proteins. ER is involved in packaging of materials to other organelles
such as lysosomes.
2. SER: it has no ribosome on its surface. Its cisternae are more tabular and
branched respectively. It is the site of steroid and phospholipids synthesis. It is
also involved in detoxification. It helps in storage of calcium and its mediation
in skeletal muscles.
NUCLEUS
It is a double membrane bounded organelle that contains nucleoplasm.
They are permeable due to the presence of nuclear pore. It is the centre of
integration in the cell. It contains genetic materials in form of nucleic acid. E.g.
RNA and DNA. It controls the activity of the cell.
NUCLEOPLASM
It is full of chromatin materials therefore making the nucleus the centre.
The dark region within the nucleus is called nucleolus which is associated with
ribosome synthesis.
GOLGI BODY/APPARATUS
This is a series of flattened sac-like structures. The main function is to
modify and package proteins and lipids after the synthesis.
LYSOSOMES
They are tiny spherical structures. Its main function is to break down
substances in the cell. This is because they contain hydrolytic enzymes that are
capable of digesting organic matters. They also help in the digestion of worn
out cells and organelles by the process called autolysis.
PEROXISOMES
They contain oxidative enzymes. Their main function is removal of toxic
materials from the cell (detoxification)
RIBOSOMES
Single membrane bounded abundant organelles. It is the site for protein
synthesis. They are consisted of proteins and ribosomonal ribonucleic.
Ribosomes are manufactured in the nucleolus at the nucleus. They are
associated with endoplasmic reticulum. It could be at 70s or 80s form.
 VACOULE
It is a spherical one membrane (tonoplast) bounded organelle containing
sap usually in large plant cell and small but numerous in other cells. In plant
cells, tonoplast helps in maintenance of turgidity in the cell.

GROWTH OF CELL
Cell reproduction occurs in plants, animals and prokaryotes. The site of
cell growth in organisms occurs at the meristems e.g. shoot (apexes) i.e. bud,
root tip actively dividing cells. In animals, somatic region and sex cell region.
CELL DIVISION IN PROKARYOTES
It is an asexual method of reproduction. The chromosomes attach to the
cell membrane makes a copy of the cells and the cell grows to about twice its
size. Therefore, the cell is formed between the chromosomes and the parent
cells split into two identical cells (clones) conjunction is formed between the
chromosomes and the parent cells split into two identical cells (clones).
Conjugation is a kind of primitive reproduction.
CELL DIVISION IN EUKARYOTES
They have nucleus and membrane bounded organelles which must be
copied exactly so that the two new cells will be similar. The original parents
and two new daughter cells must have identical chromosomes. DNA must be
copied in the S-phase of the cell cycle. Organelles found in the cytoplasm are
copied in the growth phase. Both the nucleus and the cytoplasm must be
divided during cell division in the eukaryotes.
MITOSIS
It occurs in the somatic cells or vegetative cell of the organisms. It
involves four stages which is also called phases. The features are:
1. Division of the nucleus occurs first
2. Mitosis is an asexual method of reproduction
3. It consist of four stages: prophase, metaphase, anaphase and telophase
PHOTOSYNTHESIS
This is the process by which green plants containing green pigment called
chlorophyll utilizes sunlight energy to synthesis organic food substances
notably carbohydrate (sugar) from simple inorganic raw materials. The word
“photosynthesis” was proposed Barnes in 1898. The mechanism of
photosynthesis is a redox reaction.
The two stages involved in photosynthesis include the light stage which is
also referred to as light dependent stage and dark stage which is light
independent.
The light reaction takes place in a membrane called “Thylakoid
membrane” and both stages are undergone so that ATP is formed in the light
reaction called cyclic A.T.P. formation and non-cyclic A.T.P. formation.

GENETICS, HEREDITY, GENES AND CHROMOSOMES

Genetics is defined as the scientific study of the scientific study of
heredity and variation in living things. Heredity or inheritance is defined as the
transmission and the expression of characters or traits in organisms from
parent to the offspring. Variation is defined as the differences which exist
between parents and their offspring as well as among the offspring.
Each offspring inherit or different combination of characteristics from
parents. Plant and animals have transmittable characters. Transmittable
characters in human being include:
1. Body structure or shape
2. Shape of the head, nose and ear.
3. Sizes of nose, head and ear.
4. Colour of skin, hair and eye.
5. Intelligence.
6. Blood grouping.
7. Tongue rolling.
8. Sickle cell anaemia
Transmittable characters in plant include:
1. Height of plant.
2. Size or weight
3. Size of leaf
4. Colour of leaf, flowers, seeds or fruits.
5. Taste of fruit.
6. Resistance to environment factors like diseases, pest and drought.
7. Shape of leaf, fruit and flower.
PRINCIPLES OF GENETICS.
Gregor Mendel, an Australian monk is generally given credit for having
discovered the basic principles of genetics. He did these through keen
observation as he raised peas in his garden. These principles have become the
foundation of modern genetics. They are summarized as follows:
1. In every living thing, there is a pair of genes in every cell that controls the
appearance of every trait in that individual. A gene is a unit of hereditary
material located on a chromosome. A chromosome is the rod-like carrier of
gene.
2. Individuals receive one gene for each trait from each parent.
3. Genes are transmitted from parent to offspring as an unchanging unit.
4. In the production of reproductive cells, gene pair’s separate and only one
gene for each trait is combined in each gamete. A gamete is a reproductive
cell.
5. When an individual has different genes for a trait one usually shows while
the other does not.
GENES
They are the unit of genetic material they are responsible for all the traits
or characteristics of plant and animals. Genes occur at specific locations on
chromosomes. Chromosomes control certain enzymes and protein production
that contain some plant and animals. The chromosome themselves are
composed of a protein covering surrounding two chains of DNA. These
substances serve as the coding mechanisms for heredity. The two alleles, one
each of a pair of chromosomes may be either alike or different. Pairs of genes
that are alike are said to be homozygous whereas those pairs that are different
are called heterozygous. When the two genes in a pair are different and one
gene usually expresses itself and the other remains hidden. The gene that
expresses itself is referred to as DOMINANT GENE; the gene that remains
hidden is called RECESSIVE GENE. Sometimes, neither gene of a pair
expresses itself to the exclusion of the other when this happens; the gene pair
is referred to as EXPRESSIVE PARTIAL or INCOMPLETE DOMINANCE. The actual
configuration of genes in an animal or plant is called the GENOTYPE. On the
other hand, phenotype is the term that describes the physical appearance of
the animal or plant. All this is important when exploring the basics of genetics.
Some traits are controlled by genes that are located on the chromosomes that
control the sex of the plant in animals, these are called SEX-LINKED traits. The
chromosomes that control sex in most animals are not perfectly matched. The
result is that not all of the genes on these chromosomes occur in pairs, when
this happens, some traits show only in males and some only in females. Genes
normally duplicate themselves accurately. However sometimes accidents or
changes occur. This genetic accident or changes in the genes are called
mutation. Sometimes, this mutation result results in changes in organisms that
are desirable.
MENDEL’S WORK IN GENETICS
Mendel peeped on the garden pea (Pisum sativum) at experiment land.
This plant gave him some advantages
1. The plant has clear cut characters.
2. The plant is a handy plant
3. Self pollination is natural
4. Flower construction allows for artificial pollination

WATER, P.H AND BUFFERS

WATER
WATER: It is the most abundant component of organisms and individual
cells of man containing approximately 80% water while the whole body is made
up of over 60%.
Water is important to living things because it provides the medium for
biochemical reactions. Water can also play a major role in the evolution of
biological systems. Water provides an environment for organisms to live in, as
75% of the earth is covered by water.
The importance of water as a medium of life comes from four of the
characteristics which are as follows.
1. Solvent properties
2. Heat capacity or thermal property
3. Surface tension
4. Freezing properties
SOLVENT PROPERTIES
Water is an important solvent because of its polar molecules. The
distribution of electric charge is permanently in a way that centers of positive
and negative charges are separated by close distance, this is because of the
configuration of the water molecules. Instead of being arranged in a straight
line, the hydrogen and oxygen atoms are situated asymmetrically.

The oxygen part of the molecule has a net negative charge and hydrogen
part of the molecule has a net or amount of positive charge (that makes it
neutrally electrical).
Water effectively weakens the attraction between ions of opposite charge
because of the presence of both positive and negative charges in it, it attracts
both. Water is therefore a good solvent with ionic solids and polar molecules
readily dissolve in it. This is of great biological importance because all chemical
reactions that take place in cells do so by aqueous solutions.
HEAT CAPACITY
This can be defined as the amount of heat required to raise the
temperature of one gram by one degree Celsius. Water has very high heat
capacity compared with the other liquids. In other words, a large increase in
heat results in a comparatively small rise in the temperature of the water...
This means that water is good at maintain it temperature regardless of the
fluctuations in the temperature of the surrounding environment. The biological
importance of this is that the range of temperature in which biochemical
processes can proceed is narrow and most organisms cannot tolerate wide
variation in temperature
SURFACE TENSION
It is the force that causes the surface of a liquid to contract so that it
occupies the least possible area. Surface tension is caused by the inward acting
cohesive forces between the molecules end. It is of high biological importance
because molecules dissolve in water lower its surface tension and tend to
collect at the interface between its liquid phase and other phases. This is
important in the development of plasma membrane and the movement of
molecules across it. The high surface tension of water together with the strong
cohesive forces which exist between water molecules play an important role in
the movement of water off the capillary-like vessels and traced in the stem of
plants.
FREEZING PROPERTIES
 Most liquids decrease in volume and increase in density and the
temperature drops. When such a liquid freezes, the molecules become densely
packed together and the resulting ice sinks. With water, reverse is the case as
it cooled below a certain temperature, its volume increases and density
decreases. This means that the ice that floats instead of sinking and allow
coldest ice of water to be at the surface being less dense that the slightly
warmer below. Ice is formed at the surface first and then bottom later.
Organisms living towards the bottom of fresh water, lake, sea or ocean are
therefore protected from freezing
P.H
The acidity of a solution is expressed as its P.H. This is the negative
logarithm to the base ten of the H+ concentration in mol/dm3 of solution. In
other words, it is a measure of the H+ of the solution. A P.H. of 7.0 represents
neutrality. A solution of P.H less than 7 is acidic and the lower the figure, the
higher the acidity. I.e. the greater the H+ concentration. A solution whose P.H.
is greater than 7 is basic or alkaline. The higher the figure, the higher the
basicity of the solution.

PH= -log10 [H+]

OR
Log10 1/ [H+]

BUFFER
This is a compound which behaves in such a way as to resist change in its
P.H on dilution or addition of moderate amount of acid or alkaline. In the case
of increased acidity, NaHCO3 acts as a compound by combining with free
hydrogen ion H+ . If the alkalinity is increased, it can react with the free
hydroxyl ion OH- to form carbonate ion CO3- and water H2O.
NaHCO3  Na+ + HCO3-
HCO3- + H+  H2CO3
HCO3- + OH-  CO32- + H2O
Cells and tissues can only function properly at or around neutrality; they
cannot tolerate fluctuations in P.H. of more than a unit of 2. It is essential
therefore that the P.H. of the body fluid should be kept at constant as possible.
Any tendency for the acidity to increase is contracted by the buffer which mops
up the excess H+ thereby helping to maintain constant concentrations in the
cell.

TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM
It is the movement of materials within the body of a living thing. Essential
materials such as food, oxygen and hormones are moved from their sources to
where they can be utilized or stored while waste products such as
carbondioxied, urea etc are moved to the excretory organs where they can be
eliminated out of the body. These materials are moved in solution inside
transport vessels. In higher animals, the solution or medium is blood while it is
sap in higher plants. The organs of transportation in higher animals are the
heart and the blood vessels while they are xylem and phloem in higher plants.
TRANSPORTAION IN PLANTS
Materials that are transported in plants are water, mineral salts, products
of photosynthesis and hormones. Water and mineral salts are transported by
the xylem vessels from the soil upwards to other plant parts. Products of
photosynthesis are transported from the green leaves to the other parts of the
plant for growth, respiration or storage through the phloem through the
process of translocation. Water vapour evaporates from the leaves or stem of
plants in a process of transpiration. It results in water uptake from the soil by
roots. Plants have two transport systems called the vascular bundles.
XYLEM: They are involved in the movement of water through a plant from its
roots to its leaves via the stem. During this process
-water is absorbed from the soil through hair cells
- Water moves by osmosis from the root hair cells to the root cells until it
reaches the xylem vessels
- Water is transported through the xylem vessels up the stem to the leaves and
finally, water evaporates from the leaves inform of water vapour from
transpiration.
The xylem tubes are made from dead cells
PHLOEM: They are involved in translocation. Dissolved sugars, produced during
photosynthesis and other soluble food molecules are moved from the leaves to
growing tissues and storage tissues. In contrast to the xylem, it consists of
living cells. Movement of materials in the phloem is multi-directional, in xylem
it is unidirectional. The movement of materials in xylem is driven by
transpiration pull most of the time while the movement of materials in the
phloem is by hydrostatic pressure. Transpiration is affected by light,
temperature, wind, relative humidity, atmospheric pressure and water supply.
The most important internal factor affecting transpiration is the shape of the
stomata.

EXCRETION
It is the process by which waste products of metabolism that are toxic and
not useful are removed from the body of an organism. It is an essential process
in all forms of life. The main excretory products in animals are carbon dioxide,
ammonia, urea, uric acids and salts. In unicellular organism, waste products re
excreted through the surface of the cell into the organism’s external
environment. Contractile vacuoles are organelles of water balance found in
many unicellular organisms. Nephridia are found in worms while the malphigian
tubules are the excretory organs of insects. In vertebrates, the excretory
organs are the skin, lung s and kidneys. The skin has sweat glands which
excrete sweat. The lungs remove excess carbondioxide and water vapour
during breathing. The kidney removes excess water, salts and urea from the
blood. The main products of excretion in plants are carbondioxide, water
vapour, oxygen, resins, tannins, gums, rubber and essential oils. Plants have no
special excretory organs because catabolism is much slower that in animals
thereby making accumulation of waste products much slower that in animals.
Excretion is carried out though the following ways:
1. Gaseous waste products such as oxygen and water vapour are removed
through stomata of leaves and lenticels of stems. Some waste products collect
on the leaves and part of trees (bark of trees). When the leaves and barks are
shed, wastes are also eliminated.
2. Some wastes are rendered harmless and then stored in the plants as solid
bodies e.g. resins, tannins, rubbers and gums.
Plants also excrete some waste products into the soil around them
through the root hairs