The above is a labelled diagram of an insect pollinated flower. You can tell that it is pollinated by an insect because of the large petals. In reality it would probably have a bright colour, pleasant smell and nectar to attract the pollinator. What do all the bits do? The anther and filament together are …
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Category:Biology
Leaves (Part Two)…
There is a Leaves (Part One) which you could look at before this if you are in any doubt about your leaf knowledge. The above is a cross-section through a typical leaf. There is an actual microscope photograph of a similar leaf below. It should be fairly easy to compare structures between the two pictures. …
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Leaves (Part One)…
Leaves are the factories of plants. They have a large surface area for gaseous exchange. They can absorb gases from the air through the tiny pores on their undersides called stomata (singular stoma). They also open and close these to regulate water evaporating from the leaf.
What Have The Romans Ever Done For Us…
Work done by Dr Nikola Koepke (formerly from Oxford University but now at Zurich Universtory) looked at the remains of skeletons from the 8th century BC until the 18th century AD and used changes in people’s heights over this period as a measure of how well fed they were. The study combined biology and archaeology …
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Incontinentia Buttocks…
Re-reading a post from last term on diffusion and smell inevitably made me think about flatulence. Flatulence is the polite word for farting. Apart from Her Late Majesty the Queen, everybody suffers from flatulence from time to time. Flatus (a Latin word I believe) refers to gases produced in the gut although a hefty proportion …
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Eliomys quercinus…
As I sipped my coffee this morning, I watched a mother garden dormouse (Eliomys quercinus) attempting to carry one of her young up to her nest in the eves of my house. She wedged herself between the wall and a drain pipe and scrambled upwards with the pup squeaking loudly.It had rained over night and the …
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Words, Words, Words (Bio. Ed.)…
More definitions and links to Twig Prep videos as a companion to Words (Chem. Ed.) Respiration – whilst dictionaries and encyclopaedia will define this as ‘supplying the cells with oxygen’ we always use it in the sense of “the process within all living cells that releases energy from food molecules (usually glucose)” aerobic – aerobic …
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Food Groups…
Apologies – this has ended up being a long read. Don’t feel you have to do it all in one. I will post separate pieces on much of this in the future. This might be a useful page to refer back to in the future. Graphics like this annoy me slightly. The information is good …
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Osmosis…
One of my favourite SF classroom moments was when discussing density. I said that osmium was the densest metal, and therefore the densest material that one would be likely to meet on Earth, at 22.59 g/cm3 (with iridium as a close second on 22.56 g/cm3). A voice chimed up from the front asking whether osmium …
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Even-Toed Ungulate…
The evolution of camels is particularly well documented with many connected examples of their species’ development visible through the fossil record. There were camel-like antelope grazing on the plains of North America over 40 million years ago. They have been so successful because they are well adapted to their environment. The two types of camel …
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