Course: Botany and plant physiology (Botany 22 h; Plnt physiology 22 h Practice 4 ore)
Teacher Alberto Battistelli

BOTANY
Plants: diversity and role in ecosystems and agriculture
Evolution and classification.
The plant cells.
Ontogenetic cycle and reproduction in plants
Higher plant structure and tissues.
Plant organs: the leaf, the stem, and the root. The seed.

PRACTICE
Practical activities: optical microscopy, leaves and floral components.
Practical activities: agronomical experiments, crops structure, field analysis of physiological parameters.

PLANT PHYSIOLOGY.
Biophysics and biochemistry of photosynthesis
Structure and functions of the chloroplast.
Light and photosynthesis. The solar radiations, the pigments and light absorption.
The Calvin-Benson cycle. The photosynthetic product at the chloroplast level: starch synthesis. The photosynthetic products in the cytoplasm: the sucrose synthesis. Phloem transport, sink activity, starch, and sucrose catabolism, storage compound accumulation, source-sink relationships.
Photosynthesis in the environment: structure of the photosynthetic apparatus and the role of environment (adaptation and acclimation to light, CO2, temperature, and water availability. C3, C4 and CAM photosynthetic metabolism.
Plant and water relations.
Plant respiration.
Mineral nutrition.
The hormone regulation of plant life.
Light as a signal: photoreceptors, phytochrome, photomorphogenesis, photoperiodism.
Seed physiology and germination.

TESTI
1- Rascio Elementi di fisiologia vegetale. EDISES
https://www.edises.it/docenti/rascio-elementi-di-fisiologia-vegetale.html

2- Ray F. Evert Susan E. Eichhorn La biologia delle piante di Raven. Zanichelli
Settima edizione italiana condotta sull’ottava edizione americana
https://staticmy.zanichelli.it/catalogo/assets/a05.9788808175045.pdf