3-1: Plant Physiological Effects of a Changing Environment

Pre-Class Preparation

Objectives

• To understand how a plant uses carbon dioxide and how they respond to elevated levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide.
• To understand the concept of water-use efficiency and how this relates to present and future atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide.

Procedure

1. Read the learning unit.

   Class images

2. Take the learning unit quiz. Quizzes are available from your portfolio. You may access your portfolio via the list of students participating in this year's course, as represented by the icon below.
   
   
3. Additional Required Reading. Although you are not ultimately responsible for content listed in this section, we encourage you to fully explore the links in order to provide a better scope on the upcoming class discussion.

   Houghton, J. T., L. G. Meira Filho, B. A. Callander N. Harris, A. Kattenberg, and K. Maskell, 1996:Climate Change 1995. The Science of Climate Change. Cambridge University Press, 449-454.

Class Discussion

• Problem to ponder...

• Class Discussion Summary:

Post-Class Activities

• Participate in the electronic dialog. Use this forum for:
  • continuing class discussion;
  • posing new questions to students or the instructor;
  • responding to issues/questions raised by students in class/electronic dialog.

  Visitor Access (Visitors are welcome to participate in the dialog. Just click on the icon below)	Student Access (Students must post all dialog from their portfolio. Click on the icon below to access the student list.)

• Recommended Reading Materials

  Houghton, J.T., G.J. Jenkins, J.J. Ephraums, eds, 1990: 1990 Intergovernment Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press, 289-300.

• References

  	Duarte, C. M., and S. Agusti, 1998: The CO2 balance of productive aquatic ecosystems. Science 281, 234-236.
  	Field, C. B., M. J. Behrenfeld, J. T. Randerson, and P. Falkowski, 1998: Primary production of the biosphere: Integrating terrestrial and oceanic components. Science 281, 237-240.
  	Biodiversity Glossary of Terms
  	Past and Future Rapid Environmental Changes: The Spatial and Evolutionary Response of Terrestrial Biota. From the NATO Advanced Science Institute - Publications Coordination Office
  	Photosynthesis: How plants make food. (From the Biology Department at Whitman College
  	Myneni,R.B., C.D. Keeling, C.J.Tucker, G.Asrar and R.R. Nemani, 1997: Increased Plant Growth in the Northern High Latitudes from 1981 to 1991. Nature, 386, 698-702.
  	In November 1991, a workshop entitled "CO2 and Biosphere" was held in Wageningen, The Netherlands. Thirty-two pages from that workshop are compiled in the journal Vegetation, Vol. 104/105 (January 1993). This is an excellent source of recent research information on how plants respond to changes in CO2.