AP Biology question: Plants???

Question

Describe the difference between sexual reporduction and vegetative reproduction in plants, using examples to support the question. How is vegetative reproduction related to cloning?

Answer 1

Sexual reproduction is when the plant has DNA from both a female and a male. Giving the offspring its own set of DNA.

Plants do this by:

An insect or the wind carries pollen grains from the anther of another flower.

The pollen grains land on the stigma and a pollen tube grows down through the style to the ovary.

The nucleus of the pollen grain passes down the tube. It fertilizes the egg cell inside the ovule.

The fertilized egg cell develops into an embryo. The ovary becomes the fruit and the ovule becomes a seed - from which (once dispersed) the offspring plant will grow.

Vegetative reproduction is a type of asexual reproduction found in plants, and is also called vegetative propagation or vegetative multiplication. It is a process by which new plant "individuals" arise or are obtained without production of seeds or spores.

Vegetative reproduction is like cloning because its just a replication of the plant containing the exact same DNA and no variation

Answer 2

well plants are asexual and dont need a male and female couple they are both. one part has the seed the other part has pollen and the pollen gets on the seed and fertilizes it. as to how this is related to cloning the plants are almost exact images of the parent plant. plus it doesnt require two partners of the same species because they are both.

Answer 3

There should be 2 gametes involved in sexual reproduction and zygote is formed. Flower usually represents sexual part which later forms fruit and seed after proper fertilization. But vegetative reproduction doesnt involve gametes. The totipotency of a plant is made use of in cloning. Tissue cultue, meristem culture etc are used to develope clones ie. Similar offsprings from a mother plant or part. Even somatic hybridization (sexual ie 2 different chromosomes or cell contents fuse) is possible in genetic engineering and then cloning from resultant material is possible by tissue culture. eg POMATO (PotatoXTomato)

Answer 4

Bryophyllum daigremontianum engages in both sexual and vegetative reproduction. Google the plant.

While the plant engages in sexual reproduction by sending up a stalk of flowers to solicit pollen exchange, and thereby DNA exchange to create viable seed, it also creates thousands of independent plantlets along its leaves. These plantlets drop off to grow as new, but genetically identical plants. This plant hedges its survival bets by attempting reproduction by genetic exchange, and by creating many clones of itself to try again.