Plant Phy. Review Questions for
Chapter 12
1
Is Nitrogen a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
2
Is Sulfur a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
3
Is Manganese a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
4
Is Bromide a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
5
Is Zinc a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
6
Is Phosphorus a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
7
Is Boron a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
8
Is Iron a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
9
Is Calcium a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
10
Is Potassium a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
11
Is Copper a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
12
Is Molybdenum a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
13
Is Potash a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
14
Is Chlorine a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
15
Is Magnesium a macronutrient or a micronutrient?
16 Which plant nutrient is most
often in short supply (N or K)?
17. Identify the one micronutrient among the following. (Ca or Mg or Mn or S)
18. Identify the one plant nutrient that plays the predominant role in water balance.
(K or Cl or Zn or Na)
19 If a nutrient is highly mobile, will a deficiency in that nutrient appear
first (in the older tissue or in the younger tissue)?
20 Identify the nutrient that is NOT found in proteins. (C, or P or S or N or O)
21 Soils that drain too fast, tend to be dry and nutrient poor usually have too
much (sand or silt or clay).
22. All things considered, on a world wide view, which limits plant growth the
most (mineral deficiencies or availability of water)?
23 Which form of nitrogen is the easiest for most plants to assimilate NO3- or
NH4+?
24. Which population of bacteria oxidize the NH4+ ion
to NO3- (ammonifying or nitrifying or denitrifying or
nitrogen fixing bacteria)?
25. Which of these functions do mycorrhizae probably
NOT do (enhance mineral nutrition or enhance salt tolerance or enhance water
absorption or increase pathogen resistance)?
26
Phosphate uptake by roots involves
A) a PO4 channel in
the endoderm of the root.
B) soil bacteria to
make the phosphate bioaccessable.
C) symbiotic fungal hyphae to increase the effective surface area of the root.
D) root nodules
fixing phosphate from the air.
27
In an attempt to create a nitrogen-fixing bioreactor, you set out to culture Rhizobium a) from the root nodules of pea plants. After
months of work, you are still having trouble getting the Rhizobium
to grow, let alone fix nitrogen. What might explain this failure?
A) Rhizobium only
grows in association with plant root hairs.
B) Rhizobium from
root nodules lacks a cell wall, so it will not grow in culture.
C) You accidentally put a fungicide in your
growth medium that kills all of the Rhizobium.
D) Rhizobium from
root nodules lacks chromosomal DNA, so it will not grow in culture.
28
You are performing an experiment to determine the nutrient requirements for a
newly discovered plant and find that for some reason your plants die if you
leave boron out of the growth medium but do fine with as low as 5 parts per
million in solution. This suggests that boron is
A) an essential
macronutrient.
B) a nonessential
micronutrient.
C) an essential
micronutrient.
D) a nonessential
macronutrient.
29 You are setting up some planters to grow
flowers in your apartment and discover that you bought sand rather than potting
soil. You decide to go ahead and plant the flowers in the sand to save yourself
a trip back to the store. Much to your dismay, all of your plants die! How can
you explain this failure?
A) Sand does not pack tightly enough around
the roots to hold the plants upright, so they fall over and die.
B) Sand does not hold enough water to sustain
plant metabolism, so all of the plants die from dessication.
C) Sand does not contain enough nutrient
material to sustain plant growth, so the plants die from starvation.
D) Sand is too abrasive and damages the roots
as they grow through it, so the plants die.
30
If you discover a purely white plant growing on the forest floor, you can
safely assume that it is a
A) mutant plant that
uses a colorless pigment to carry out photosynthesis.
B) parasitic plant
that acquires its macronutrients from other plants.
C) plant that only
carries out the dark reactions of photosynthesis and therefore doesn't need
green pigments.
D) plant that does
not require macronutrients and therefore does not need photopigments.
31
Growing peas that are defective in flavonoid
production would
A) prevent
bioaccumulation of potassium in the roots.
B) prevent
bioaccumulation of nitrogen in the roots.
C) prevent bioaccumulation
of phosphorous in the roots.
D) prevent the
production of flavor molecules in the seeds so that they would be unpalatable.
32
Feeding your Venus flytrap a common brand of all-purpose plant fertilizer would
likely cause
A) it to die from
nitrogen overload.
B) its traps to
become large enough to capture small mammals.
C) no change,
because these plants can only use nitrogen from insects.
D) its traps to fall
off, because it would not need to acquire nitrogen from insects.