Biology
Strategic Defense in the Plant Kingdom
The purpose of this literature review is to detail the different ways plants protect themselves from predators. Knowledge of plant defenses can help boost understanding of more effective means of minimizing pesticide and herbicide use in agriculture or alternatively, to help develop more effective and targeted chemical pesticides and herbicides. Understanding plant defenses requires knowledge of plant biology and their role in their respective ecosystems. Moreover, their defenses ensure the survival not only of individual plants, but of whole ecosystems.
Plants have no immune system, in the same way animals do (Freeman & Beattie, 2008). Instead, they boast "a stunning array of structural, chemical, and protein-based defenses designed to detect invading organisms and stop them before they are able to cause extensive damage," (p. 1). The defenses plants have evolved to ward off predators can be loosely grouped into three categories: surface-based protections (morphological protections such as thorns), polymers and other substances that diminish digestibility (molecular mechanisms, such as the development of indigestible leaves), and actual toxins (biochemical poisons). Additionally, plants can also attract species that prey on herbivores in an indirect form of self-protection ("Plant Defense Against Being...
2012). Many of these types of protection work congruously and simultaneously, allowing plants to develop a systematic strategic defense plan suitable for their environment.
The production and release of volatiles epitomizes the ways plants use a number of different protection mechanisms at the same time. Plants release more volatiles when they are under attack by herbivorous insects (Pare & Tumlinson, 1999). At the same time, many airborne volatiles attract other insect species that prey on the herbivores. Pare & Tumlinson (1999) call the process of attracting predators a "distress call," because the plant will only release the volatile compounds when they are under attack by herbivorous insects. The volatile compounds are airborne.
Another example of how plants combine the effects of two or more defenses is with the use of polymers plus poisons. Polymers on their own form a cohesive defensive front for plants, because this group of substances includes cellulose, lignin, tannins, and silicates (Schardl, 2002). Polymers minimize the digestibility and/or nutritive content of the plant's materials. Yet by combining polymers with poison, plants launch a particularly sneaky attack on herbivorous insects. The insects are forced to eat more of the plant because of the polymers, but the plant simultaneously protects itself by…
Abstract The relationship between a predator and a prey is quite essential to the dynamics in the wild. Various classic approaches have been employed in the attempt to predict and comprehend the nature of the consumptive interaction between a predator and a prey (Schmitz, 2017). Using this approach has not yielded any sufficient insight on the context and complexity that is characteristic of the relationship between predators and preys. Schmitz (2017)
The RHDl gene product appears to be necessary for proper initiation of root hairs, whereas the RHDS, RHD3, and RHD4 gene products are required for normal hair elongation. These results demonstrate that root hair development in Arabidopsis is amenable to genetic dissection and should prove to be a useful model system to study the molecular mechanisms governing cell differentiation in plants.(Schiefelbein & Somerville, 1990, p.235) The genetic analysis of root
information technology skills I acquired through the military are transferable to civilian situations. The 20 years I gave to the military have placed me in a wide variety of situations quite different from what others might encounter in civilian life. My experience in the U.S. Navy has allowed me to learn new skills in the information technology field and I have been able to apply them in new situations. The
The Galapagos rats were able to survive by floating on large pieces of vegetation or debris to reach the islands. In fact, the rats "hold the world record for ocean crossings by land mammals," (Galapagos Conservation Trust 2008). About 1600 species of insects inhabit the Galapagos including large ones like locusts, butterflies and moths. The Galapagos also has unique species of land snails. Hundreds of fish species live in the
brevis blooms are not a new phenomenon, and fish kills that result from red tides caused by K. brevis in the Gulf of Mexico have been described in the scientific literature since 1960 or so and have been reported anecdotally for more than two centuries (Naar et al. 2002). In this regard, Backer and her associates (2005) emphasize that, "The human health effects from consuming shellfish with high concentrations
Zionism is even being identified with Christianity, with evangelicals uniting themselves to Israeli interests. Need we remind ourselves that Zionism is a politico-religious belief that is diametrically opposed to Christian values? The post-war propaganda that followed WWII even helped obliterate the notion of Jesus Christ as Holocaust and replace it with the Shoah, the Jewish holocaust. At the heart of Zionism is the eradication of Christian culture and the