Introduction

This module will introduce you to some key concepts in Botany including plant structure, plant taxonomy (major divisions), sexual reproduction in angiosperms (flowering plants), plant hormones (growth regulators), plant repsonses to stimuli and plant communities and habitats. Some of the material covered in this module is from A-level, other material is in addition to A-level courses and gives an overview of some of the topics covered in university Year 1 botany courses. Also refer to module 1.7 photosynthesis.

Why are plants important?

Plants are amazing organisms. All terrestrial life is dependent on plants because of the following reasons.

Plants are primary producers (autotrophs)

Plants provide us with oxygen (a waste product of photosynthesis)

Plants provide us with food (what did you eat for breakfast?)

Plants provide us with raw materials and energy (timber for building, wood for burning)

Plants provide us with medicines (all medicinces are derived from compunds produced by plants to deter herbivores)

Plants provide us with recreation (parks, nature reserves)

Plants + geology = landscape (if you take away plants you just have rocks! where will all the animals live and what will they eat?)

Plants include some of the oldest (Bristlecone Pine) and the largest (Giant Redwood) organisms on the planet

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Summer Sunset at The Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest Giant redwoods

Giraffe Eating Butterfly

Here you will learn about plants from the individual (including cellular and anatomical structure, how they respond to their environments and how they reproduce), through to their place within a community and how they form habitats. You will also be introduced to the diversity of different species we have, from the small non-vascular bryophytes (mosses) to the vascular non-flowering plants (ferns), the evergreen coniferous trees and the angiosperms (flowering plants). Angiosperms include the tiny least duckweed (Lemna minuta) which is only 3 mm long, to the largest flowering plant, the Australian Eucalyptus (Eucalyptus regnans) which grows over 100 m tall!

Plants are the basal component of all terrestrial ecosystems and we, nor other terrestrial life would not exist without them. Before you begin this module, make a list of everything you have done today that you can be thankful to plants for. Here's three points to get you started:

1. I woke up in my wooden bed (made from trees: Pinus sp. ) under a cotton blanket (made from cotton plant: Gossypium sp.)

2. I took a breath (oxygen provided by plants as a waste product of photosynthesis)

3. I had a banana (fruit from banana tree: Musa sp.), a piece of toast (made from seeds of a grass called wheat: Triticum sp.) and a cup of tea (leaves of tea plant: Camellia sinensis) for breakfast (all ingredients are plants, assuming you drink your tea black.).