Physiology Lab

BIOLOGY-479 INTEGRATED PHYSIOLOGY LABORATORY

Dept. of Biological & Allied Health Sciences

BLOOMSBURG UNIVERSITY of PENNSYLVANIA

LAB REPORT: PLANT WATER POTENTIALS AND WATER TRANSLOCATION

Group Members: Taylor Howells

Marisa Buckle

Ryan Austin

Adam Bertino

Lab Section: 02, Wednesday 2pm-5pm

Experiment Date: January 11, 2014

Report Submitted: February 18, 2014

EXPERIMENT 1:

Experiment 1 consisted of two hypotheses. Our first hypothesis was if a stem is cut once and water flows out from the remaining portion, then the mechanism is a pressure pump. Our second hypothesis was if a stem is cut in two places and the water flows out the bottom of the portion that was cut, then the mechanism would be a vacuum pump. When the first experiment was performed, water did not flow up and out of the stem. When the second experiment was performed, water did not flow down and out of the stem. In both experiments the water stayed in the stem and did not flow out at all. These experiments indicate that neither a pressure pump nor a vacuum pump are responsible for the uptake of water to the top of the plant. Based on our results, our hypotheses are not supported. The flow of water to the top of the plant would be caused by capillary action working together with adhesion and cohesion.

Simplified to:

EXPERIMENT 2:

= 14.72 (m*microns)r (microns)

Where h = the height with which water can be lifted by capillary action and r = radius of the column

GRAPH 1

Figure 1. Calculated and theoretical heights of water in the panes compared to distance between the panes of glass. Diamond labels (♦) represent measured height of water in the panes of glass. Square labels (■) represent theoretical height of water in the panes of glass.

GRAPH 2

Figure 2. Observed height of water in the panes compared to the theoretical height of water in the panes. Slope of the trend line was 0.4343.

GRAPH 3

Figure 3. Observed distances...