Breathing plants...(Science experiment)
Breathing plants
Have the thought ever crossed your mind that plants can breathe?
No?
Today I am going to explain to you how plants breathe, and then we are going to do a simple experiment to show you how a plant breathe.
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The science behind breathing plants
Plants give out carbon dioxide and then they absorb oxygen from the air that surrounds them. But plants don't have lungs or a blood stream.
The green plant respires all the time, day and night. All parts of the plant respire, the leaves, the stem, the roots and even the flowers. The parts that are above the soil receives their oxygen directly from the air through their pores. These pores in the leaves are called stomata, the singular form is stoma.
They use cellular respiration to convert nutrients that is obtained from soil into the energy that fuels the plants' cellular activities.
Photosynthesis is also used to provide the plants with glucose. It is the process where light energy is converted into chemical energy that is then stored in glucose that can then later be used in respiration within the green parts of the plant that contains the chlorophyll.
An important difference to take note of is that: During respiration plants consume the nutrients to keep their plant cells alive. during photosynthesis plants create their own food.
Image by Rookie Parenting
The science experiment
You will need the following:
- Glass or plastic bowl
- Lukewarm water
- Leaf (A leaf that you have removed from the tree or plant.)
Instructions:
- Fill a large bowl with lukewarm water.
- Head outside and find a leaf.
- Place the leaf in a bowl of water.
- Put a small rock on top of the leaf to help it to fully submerge under the water.
- Place the bowl outside in the sun.
- Leaf the bowl there for a couple of hours.
- Return after a couple of hours and look at the small bubbles that form around the leaf and the edges of the bowl.
- When the leave is submerged it breathes, just as when we take a deep breathe, jump into water and let your breathe out. The same, little bubbles, is created.
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