Plant Diversity PDF

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Sunday, 6 October 2019Plant DiversityBI1003 Organisms and the EnvironmentWhy does the world need plant scientists: Food security The global population is expected to be roughly 9 billion by 2050, and food production must therefore increase by 60-110% in order to supply enough for the growing populat...

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Sunday, 6 October 2019

Plant Diversity BI1003 Organisms and the Environment! Why does the world need plant scientists: ! • Food security! The global population is expected to be roughly 9.6 billion by 2050, and food production must therefore increase by 60-110% in order to supply enough for the growing population. ! Improving the productivity of the crop would improve the overall yields. This can be done by breeding by selecting for yield and GM. ! Food waste must also decrease, as currently food was is 1/3 to 1/2 of all food produced. This is due to poor storage conditions, disease and pests, retail (short shelf life and poor cosmetic appearance) and household food waste. ! There is also the need to develop crops that are adapted to cope with climate change, as it will drastically affect crop production. Traits that would be beneficial are droughtresistant, flooding-tolerance and salt-resistance! Up to 40% of global crop yield is lost due to plant pests and diseases every year!

• Environmental sustainability! Resources need to be used more efficiently. ! Fertiliser and pesticide use needs to be reduced, as the production uses fossil fuels, with the phosphate reserves running out, and their application causes eutrophication which damages the biodiversity of the affected area. ! Farming also has drastic affects on biodiversity, with 67% of wildlife species found in the UK farmlands under threat from agricultural practices. ! 1

Sunday, 6 October 2019 Plants are the keystone to nearly all global ecosystems! • Green bioeconomy! The large use of fossil fuels contributes to global warming and climate change, and the oil reserves are sunning out so there is a need to find plant based replacements for fuel. ! Possible replacements could be found in algae and miscanthus.! Plants produce a wide range if natural products that could be exploited if we purify them, and plants could also be engineered into biological factories to produce pharmaceuticals and vaccines. ! • Healthier foods! Two billion people on earth suffered from micronutrient deficiencies, and therefore healthier, more nutritional food needs to be cultivated, such as golden rice, which contains high levels of beta-carotene, which could help the 750,000 children that go blind yearly from a vitamin A deficiency. !

Plants have indeterminate growth and organisms within a species are morphologically different according to their growth environment. Individuals can respond to changes in their environment, and plants can inhabit most habitats. ! Plant cells have the ability to undifferentiate and then re-differentiate, which means you can regenerate a whole plant from almost any piece of tissue. !

Micropropagation - The process of rapidly producing stock plant material to produce many progeny plants, which is done using modern tissue culture methods. It is used to replicate plants that have been genetically modified or bred through conventional plant breeding methods!

Basic Plant Evolution!...