3/8/11 stations

Today we started class by taking out our lab sheets from yesterday. Mr. finley said then that we were going to be doing station work today. Our group first had to do station 1 which was completing questions in the textbook on page 97. Another group was at the smartboard with Mr. Finley, and the last group was online at cellsalive.com on the mitosis site. At station 1 the group went over some qustions about mitosis based on a graph with the amount of time the cell spends in each section. Some of the questions were like how long is the cell in interphase and how long is mitosis. Our group got done with all the multiple choice questions and then got to some open-ended ones about how to set up an experiment to test for mitosis while changing a ariable. We said that you could do one plant under high power light and another under low and a final one with no light.At the smart board with Mr. Finley we said that in the onion root cell we will see mitosis because the roots need to get water for the onion. We also said that the died parts in the cell are chromosomes that are seperating and that different cells can be in different stages but one cell can be inbetween two different stages. We said that in anaphase spindle fibers pull apart the chromosomes to make a new cell. We did not get to station 3 so check Tomorrows blog to see what happens on cells alive.com in stage 3.
I(n the picture above chromosomes are being seperated to make a new cell.

PH

1/26/11 Photosynthesis vs Cellular Respiration

Today we satrted out class by Mr. Finley coming around to check homework. We then discussed the formula for photosynthesis and cellular respiration. (Cellular respiration- C6H12O6---> 6CO2+6H2O+ATP) (Photosynthesis- 6CO2+6H2O+light energy----> C6H12O6+6O2)

We then said that the formulas were backwards. The Reactants and the products are reversed. The purpose of photosynthesis was to make glucose and the purpose of cellular respiration was to break down glucose to make energy. Since the process is reversed the equations must be reversed. We took a survey to determine that plants do go through respiration. Plants need energy so they must go through respiration. Plants dont just give off oxygen. We cant live in a world where there are only lions and us. They eat us and we eat them. If there were no plants there would be no glucose and no ATP (energy) so we cant move and function without it. Then we discussed a triangle of an energy chain. It went with Plants, Primary sources, Secondary consumers, and then Tertiary consumers from bottom to top(more energy to less energy) The tertiary consumers would have to eat more plants to be at a high energy level. Photosynthesis uses the light energy to make ATP. Plants use ATP to do everything they do and they use light energy to make glucose. We then related this to our excersise experiment. As a result of doing the excersise our CO2 rate went up and cellular respiration happened. We needed more energy (cellular respiration) so that is why CO2 levels went up. You warm because your body needs to get ready for the excersise. you have to tell yourself to start respiration and give you energy. Todays class seemed to give us a better understanding of photosynthesis vs cellular respiration.

PH