Principle

The stem of plants must accomplish various functions. It supports the leaves, the lateral branches, and the blossoms. The mechanical supportive tissue (collenchyma) is responsible for the necessary stability and elasticity. Did you ever come to think about how a 20m-tall tree is capable of transporting water all the way from its roots to its crown? Or how it may be possible that assimilates from the leaves ever arrive at the roots? We want to explore this pathway of transportation, for which all plants
possess a one-way traffic system. The vascular bundles contain vessels for transporting water from the bottom up, and sieve tubes for transporting assimilates from the top down to the bottom. The structural arrangement of the vascular bundles in the
dicotyledonous plants differs distinctly from the arrangement found in the monocotyledonous plants.

Benefits

• Experiment is part of a complete solution set with a total of 50 experiments for all microscopy applications
• With student worksheet, appropriate for all class levels
• With detailed instructor information, incl. sample microscopy image
• Optimized for tight schedules, i.e. minimum preparation time required
• Microscopy solution set specifically designed to include all required accessories
• Content available with matching multimedia files

Tasks

1. Explore the structure of the stem and the arrangement of the vascular bundles in monocotyledonous plants!

Learning objectives

• Stem
• Monocotyledonous plants
• Leaves
• Lateral branches
• Blossoms
• Vascular bundles