Unit PLANT ECOPHYSIOLOGY
- Course
- Natural and environmental sciences and technologies
- Study-unit Code
- GP004106
- Curriculum
- In all curricula
- Teachers
-
- Chandra Bellasio (Codocenza)
- Hours
- 42 ore (Codocenza) - Chandra Bellasio
- CFU
- 6
- Course Regulation
- Coorte 2024
- Offered
- 2024/25
- Learning activities
- Affine/integrativa
- Area
- Attività formative affini o integrative
- Academic discipline
- BIO/04
- Type of study-unit
- Obbligatorio (Required)
- Type of learning activities
- Attività formativa monodisciplinare
- Language of instruction
- Italian and English
- Contents
- Questo corso esamina come i processi delle piante rispondono agli stimoli ambientali, integrando concetti di fisiologia, ecologia e biologia ambientale. Si concentra su argomenti chiave come le relazioni idriche, lo scambio gassoso, il bilancio energetico e le risposte delle piante agli stress biotici e abiotici.
- Reference texts
- Park S. Nobel, Physicochemical and Environmental Plant Physiology (any edition).
Handouts - Educational objectives
- Students will gain hands-on experience in experimental techniques, data analysis, and the application of ecophysiological knowledge to address real-world challenges like climate change and resource management.
- Teaching methods
- 42 hours of lectures
- Learning verification modality
- There will be two written tests, one in the middle of the course and one at the end. Passing both tests grants access to the oral exam, whose evaluation will be independent of the test results. Those who have not passed the tests can retake them one at a time before each oral session. For information on support services for students with disabilities and/or specific learning disorders (SLD), visit the page [http://www.unipg.it/disabilita-e-dsa].
- Extended program
- General Part: Techniques
Experimental types (screening, descriptive experiments, hypothesis testing)
Gravimetric measurements (evapotranspiration, RWC, growth and shoot/root ratio)
Elemental analysis
Visual analyses (leaf anatomy, stomatal analysis, wood analysis)
Water potential, osmotic potential, turgor
Radiation
Temperature
Transpiration (porometry)
Photosynthesis (optical methods, oxigraphy)
Fluorescence
Isotopic composition (mass spectrometry and optical methods)
Hydraulic conductance (flowmeter)
Cavitation (acoustic methods)
Remote sensing, photographic and hyperspectral analyses
Free Air CO2 Enrichment (FACE), Free Air Temperature Increase (FATI)
Introduction to modeling (empirical and mechanistic models)
Special Part: Short- and Medium-Term Responses
Basic responses of healthy plants (A/PPFD curves, A/Ci curves, fluorescence at different oxygen levels)
Data analysis and basic curve fitting
Stomatal regulation and gas exchange
Photosynthetic limitation analysis
Water use efficiency and nitrogen use efficiency
Light stress (shading, photoinhibition, UV), regulation and acclimation mechanisms, phenotypic plasticity (leaf, stem, root)
CO2 (subambient, elevated)
Water (drought, flooding), desiccation tolerance in seeds and plants, hydraulic conductance and embolism in plants, hypoxia
Stress hormones
Temperature (cold and heat)
Salinity stress and halophytes
Photosynthetic pathways (C3, C4, CAM) and their ecological significance
Altitude
Desert plants