Download Study Questions Lecture 1: Plant anatomy, development and life

Study Questions
Lecture 1: Plant anatomy, development and life cycle
1.
What are the major plant groups and what characterizes them?
2.
Name features/functions that are common to all plant groups
3.
What characterizes the life cycles of plants? (and even fungi)
4.
What generation is dominant in mosses vs flowering plants? How does this
affect genetic analysis of these organisms?
5.
What are meristems in plants, and what is their function? What meristems
can you find in an adult woody plant?
6.
What tissues are there in the vascular system, and what is their function?
7.
What characterizes secondary growth in plants?
8.
What is the function of the seed in plants? What traits/adaptations
characterize the mature embryo?
Lecture 2: The plant cell: organelles, signaling, transcription
9.
What are oleosins?
10. What are protein bodies and in what plant structures are they dominant?
11. What is the function of plant vacuoles?
12. How does the cytoskeleton affect cell shape in plants?
13. Name three classes of light receptors
14. What type of responses are mediated by phytochromes?
15. Describe the relationship between light signaling and the proteasome
Lecture 4: Plant hormones
16. Name five major plant hormones. Name (at least) one response that
characterizes each of them
17. Describe two fundamentally different types of hormone responses.
18. Describe (shortly) gibberillin (GA) signaling during germination.
19. What is Agent Orange?
20. What is the triple response?
21. What two hormones are used in tissue culture? Describe how their ratios
affect growth of undifferentiated tissue (callus)
22. Give an example of a primary and a secondary response to abscisic acid
(ABA). Justify your answer.
Lecture 6: Plant Model Organisms; Techniques for transformation of plants or
plant cells; Gene silencing in plants
23. Why do plants have large genomes?
24. What is a model species? Name four plant model species and describe
shortly their main advantage or what are they useful for.
25. Name (at least) five advantages of Arabidopsis thaliana as a model plant.
26. How many weeks does it take to complete the Arabidopsis life cycle?
27. Why is it not desirable for a model organism to have high frequency of gene
duplications?
28. What is a signature of ancient polyploidization in a genome?
29. What is gene redundancy?
30. What is T-DNA insertional mutagenesis?
31. How is insertional mutagenesis produced in rice?
32. How does Agrobacterium tumefaciens transform plants in nature?
33. Where do you find Agrobacterium in nature?
34. What is a Ti plasmid? What categories of genes are found in a natural Ti
plasmid?
35. Which functions of the Ti plasmid are removed in plant vectors (binary
vectors)
36. Why are plant vectors sometimes described as non-oncogenic?
37. Describe the Arabidopsis floral dip method of transformation. Are the
obtained seeds homozygous or heterozygous? Justify your answer.
38. What are the natural hosts of Agrobacterium?
39. What is a reporter gene? Name three non-selectable reporter genes
commonly used in plant research.
40. Name three selectable marker genes commonly used for plant
transformation.
41. Describe the method of agroinfiltration.
42. What is VIGS?
43. How is site-specific mutagenesis produced in plants? What type of
mutations is this method useful for?
Lecture 8: Tolerance to abiotic and biotic stress
44. What are compatible osmolytes?
45. What is the role of LEA proteins?
46. What are ABREs and AREBs?
47. What is ERA1?
48. Name and describe shortly the three major infection strategies used by
plant pathogens.
49. Name four groups of secondary metabolites with roles in plant passive
defense.
50. What are phytoalexins?
51. What is the hypersensitive response?
52. What is systemic acquired resistance?
Lecture 9: Wood Biotechnology
53. Name the three major components of wood.
54. Describe the difference between a dicot primary cell wall (PSW) and a
secondary cell wall (SCW).
55. What is biopulping?
56. Describe the benefits of using enzymes in the Pulp and Paper industry.
57. Give examples of enzymes that can be used in the Pulp and Paper industry
and in which processes they are applied.
58. Briefly describe the XET-technology used for fiber modification.
59. What is so different between the history of agricultural plant breeding and
the history of breeding trees?
60. What are the benefits and risks of using GMO-trees?
61. You would like to identify an enzyme involved in hemicellulose biosynthesis.
How would you proceed?
Lecture 10: Improved nutritional content and functional foods; GMO controversy
& GMO-regulations
62. What are the advantages of no-tillage agriculture?
63. What are Bt crops?
64. What laws are there in Sweden for production or handling of genetically
modified organisms?
65. Describe briefly the mode of action of glyphosate and glufosinate. Describe
also possible mechanisms of resistance (in plants).
Lecture 12: Plants as green factories for production of raw materials for non-food
applications: Biofuels & proteins
66. What is the advantage of producing pharmaceutical proteins in crop plants?
What are the risks?
67. What are the advantages of producing pharmaceutical proteins in aquatic
plants? Give two examples of aquatic plant species that are used for this
purpose.
68. Name and briefly describe five necessary steps to produce bioethanol from
lignocellulose feedstocks.
69. Why are perennial grasses promising as lignocellulose feedstocks for
bioethanol production? (i.e. what are their advantages)