Assignment 6

For each plant, perform an experiment that involves four or five different temperatures, ranging from low to high temperature. Use the same range of temperatures for each plant. For each plant, make sure that you pick the ideal values for gas flow that were used in the previous assignments. Leave the CO₂ level set at its default value of 350 ppm. Measure photosynthesis for light values beginning at 0 mmol/m²/s and continue this experiment by increasing light concentration to 200, 400, 600, and so on, until you reach 2000 mmol/m²/s.
For each plant, fit curves of P versus light intensity to the data for each of the temperatures that you selected. Print the plots for each plant so you can compare your data with data from the experiments conducted by the other pair of students in your group. Work together with the other students in your group to analyze your data as described below. To compare some of these data, you may need to gather your data together and draw your own plots with data from several different plants on the same plot.


1 .		For each plant, draw conclusions about the effects of temperature on photosynthetic rate, dark respiration rate, photochemical efficiency, and photosynthetic saturation.

2 .		For which plants did temperature show the greatest effects on the parameters of photosynthesis that you studied? Which plants were affected the least by changes in temperature?

3 .		Based on what you know about the properties of each plant, such as the type of photosynthesis it utilizes (C₃ versus C₄), preferred environmental conditions for growth, and locations where each plant typically grows, explain whether the temperature effects that you saw for each parameter make sense or not.