Unit PLANT ECOPHYSIOLOGY
- Course
- Natural and environmental sciences and technologies
- Study-unit Code
- GP004106
- Curriculum
- In all curricula
- Teacher
- Chandra Bellasio
- Teachers
-
- Chandra Bellasio
- Hours
- 42 ore - Chandra Bellasio
- CFU
- 6
- Course Regulation
- Coorte 2025
- Offered
- 2025/26
- 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
- Lectures will be in Italian, handouts will be in English, the exam may be taken in Italian or English
- Contents
- This course examines how plant processes respond to environmental stimuli, integrating concepts from physiology and ecology. The first part (Review) revisits the fundamentals of plant physiology: the physical and physicochemical processes that govern water and solute transport through cells and the whole plant; the mechanisms through which the plant uses light energy to absorb and assimilate carbon dioxide and minerals from the soil; and the basics of regulatory mechanisms. The second part (General section) reviews methodologies used to study plants and their responses. The third part (Special section) provides a detailed overview of how healthy plants respond to perturbations in environmental conditions such as light, temperature, CO2, and water availability. Students will gain practical experience with experimental techniques and data analysis.
- Reference texts
- Park S. Nobel, Physicochemical and Environmental Plant Physiology (any edition) L. Taiz, E. Zeiger, Plant Physiology (any edition)
- Educational objectives
- Knowledge (Dublin Descriptor 1) The course aims to provide in-depth knowledge of the tools used to measure and analyze plant responses to major environmental perturbations and to understand them within an integrated framework based on key concepts of plant physiology. Applying Knowledge and Understanding Students will be able to analyze representative ecophysiology studies and understand the described phenomena by linking them to the fundamental processes of plant physiology.
- Teaching methods
- 42 hours of lectures.
- Learning verification modality
- There will be two written tests: one mid-course and one at the end. Passing both tests grants access to the oral exam. Students who do not pass the tests may retake them in recovery sessions. For information on support services for students with disabilities and/or learning disorders, please visit http://www.unipg.it/disabilita-e-dsa
- Extended program
- Review Basic thermodynamics: the first law; free energy; the second law; chemical potential. Water: chemical properties; surface tension; menisci, cavities, and bubbles; capillary rise. Hygrometry, evaporation, condensation, drying, and humidification. Solution dynamics: chemical potential during generic changes; diffusion; electrolytes and membrane potential at equilibrium. Osmosis. Water potential. Laminar flow.Water and the plant: turgor; pressure–volume curves; transpiring structures; transpiration and relative humidity; transpiration and temperature; water potential in the plant at equilibrium with soil; cohesion–tension theory; xylem hydraulic conductivity; minimum tension for water ascent; embolism and cavitation; cavity stability; rupture and refilling of cavities; hydraulic vulnerability; embolus refilling. Water uptake: absorbing structures; Casparian strip; water potential in transpiring plants. Solute transport: semipermeable membranes and equilibrium concentration; electrogenic pumps; primary and secondary membrane transport; symport and antiport. CO2 assimilation, light phase: light and pigments; electron transporters; excitation; charge separation; photosystem I; photosystem II; oxygen evolution; photophosphorylation; cyclic and pseudocyclic transport. Carbon metabolism: review of catalysis; C3 cycle; Rubisco mechanism; oxygenation and carboxylation; PGA reduction; regeneration; starch and sucrose synthesis. Photorespiration. C2 cycle. C2 and C4 photosynthesis: anatomy; subtypes; ecology. CAM plants. Phloem transport: vascular anatomy review; transported compounds; sources and sinks; apoplastic phloem loading; translocation; unloading. Excess light: leaf and chloroplast movements; NPQ and xanthophyll cycle; state transitions. Regulation of Rubisco. Regulation of the RPP cycle. Regulation of starch and sucrose synthesis. Stomatal regulation: anatomical review; guard cells; turgor; response to red and blue light; response to CO2; stomatal closure and relative humidity. General Section: Techniques Experimental approaches (screening, descriptive experiments, hypothesis testing) Free Air CO2 Enrichment, Free Air Temperature Increase (FATI) Gravimetric measurements (evapotranspiration, RWC, growth and shoot/root ratio) Elemental analysis Visual analysis (leaf anatomy, stomatal analysis, wood analysis) Water potential, osmotic potential, turgor Radiation (light intensity, spectrophotometry) Temperature (bulb thermometers, thermocouples) Transpiration (porometry) Photosynthesis (optical methods, oxygen evolution) Fluorescence Isotopic composition (mass spectrometry and optical methods) Hydraulic conductance (laboratory and field flowmeters) Cavitation (acoustic methods) Introduction to modeling (empirical and mechanistic models) Special Section: Short- and Medium-Term Responses Basic responses of healthy plants (A/PPFD curves, A/Ci, fluorescence at different oxygen levels) Data analysis and basic curve fitting Photorespiration measurements Analysis of photosynthetic limitations Water-use efficiency and nitrogen-use efficiency Short-, medium- and long-term responses to: CO2 (sub-ambient, elevated) Light (shading, photoinhibition, UV): regulation mechanisms and acclimation, phenotypic plasticity (leaf, stem, root); shade avoidance and signal transduction Temperature (heat and cold), case study: midday depression of assimilation Water deficit