Pollen Data Spreadsheet

This is a data table of information we collected on our pollen samples after sing the sem microscope. The sem gave us the ability to take a closer look at the number of apertures and surface texture of the pollen grains.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AoX295BKwdhrdDlpNHBJc05DMmdQZzNlNkxKQ3EzakE&output=html

SEM data

This post is a collection of images we collected from the sem microscope.

Alstroemeria:

This is an image of an alstroemeria pollen grain at 2000x. It is 81.5um in width.

In the photo above you can see the up close texture of the Alstroemeria pollen at 7250x

 

Gypsophila:

 Here is the gypsophila pollen grain at 2000x. It is 38.3um in width.

Here it is again at 5000x

Delphinium:

Here is the delphinium pollen grain at 2000x. It is 45.1um in width.

Here is the pollen grain at 6950x, you can see the dotted texture.

Procedure

Lab Procedure 

To prove our hypothesis we devised a way to compare the samples of flowers with their respective pollen size. 

Our first step was finding 3 flowers of varying sizes. Our choices were Alstroemeria aurea, Gypsophila paniculata, and Delphinium parishii. These choices allowed for us to compare pollen over a range of different flower sizes.


           Alstroemeria aurea        


           Gypsophila paniculata     


     Delphinium parishii   
        

Under a stereomicroscope we dissected both the Delphinium parishii and the Alstroemeria aurea. We then put the pollen on a stub which was separated by fiduciary marks into 3 sections. The Gypsophila paniculata was too small to dissect so we instead pressed the anthers on to the carbon tape which transported pollen from the flower to the stub.

After the stub was prepared, we photographed it as well as our flowers under the Leica microscope at 35x magnification.

 

Above is our stub photographed at 35x on the Leica microscope.

Between 2 & 3: Gypsophila
Between 3 & 1: Delphinium
Between 1 & 2: Alstroemeria


When preparing for the SEM we followed the standard procedure for safely putting our stub inside. Once the stub had been displayed on the screen we found individual pollen grains for each of our samples. At this point we photographed each grain and measured their widths. We then zoomed in to see the surface texture on each pollen grain.

Once this was done we had enough data to prove or disprove our hypothesis. When comparing the widths of the pollen grains to the widths of the flowers, we discovered that in our sample of Alstroemeria aurea, Gypsophila paniculata, and Delphinium parishii the pollen grain size was proportionate to the size of the flower.

Hypothesis

Our hypothesis is that the smaller the plant size the smaller the pollen grain and vice versa with larger plants. If we are correct, gypsophila will have the smallest pollen size, delphinium will be second biggest, and Alstroemeria will be the largest.

Delphinium Background

• Genus of over 300 in the Ranunculaceae family
• Delphinium Also known as  Perennial Larkspur
• Native to Northern Hemisphere
• Grows Quickly.
• Pollenated by bumble bee's and humming birds.
• average pollen size was about 99 μm
• toxic to humans, Death is through cardiotoxic and neuromuscular blocking effects, and can occur within a few hours of ingestion.
• Our Delphinium flower was .5 inches in width.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/                                                                  picture I took of Delphinum
                                                                                                                   under a microscope

Alstromeria Background

Alstromeria, more commonly known as the Peruvian lily has 6 petals. Three have dark spots at the base, they are pink with a touch of yellow. The other sepals are larger and more pigmented.  Our Alstromeria flower was 2 inches in diameter. http://www.bhg.com/gardening/plant-dictionary/perennial/alstroemeria/

This is a picture of what an alstroemeria flower looks like before dehydration, or disection.

We got this image here

Here is a picture of Alstroemeria 's pollen grain on a 400x compound microscope:

Gypsophila image

Gypsophila paniculata pollen grain under 400x view of compound light microscope & in a solution of  growth media. 

Gypsophila Background

Gypsophila: 

"Any of a large genus (Gypsophila) of Old World herbs of the pink family having small delicate usually paniculate flowers" (Merriam Webster)

- Dicot
- Perrenial
- Caryophyllaceae Family 

Flowers - Many flowers 6-8mm in diameter, 5 white petals 2-4mm long, 5 fused cup like sepals. (Link)

Our gypsophila pollen grains were roughly 112.5 micrometers in length when we estimated under the compound mircoscope, it willl be interesting to find out if the sem microscope gives us a similar result, considering it is more accurate than my calculations. 

Lab Question

Our evolutionary question for this lab was, does pollen size vary in the size of the plant. Meaning do larger plants have larger pollen sizes and do smaller plants have smaller pollen sizes.

Going further, we also tried to figure out during this lab: is there an average pollen size? and how does pollen get its size?

Lab Team Agreement/Addendum

Agreement:

Our group consists of Brody, Claire, and Chris. We are each going to do background research on our flower, to come up with cohesive hypothesis to answer our lab experimental question. Claire will take and post the sem photos, Brody will be responsable for the procedure, and we will work together to form our analysis and phylogenetic trees.

Adendum

Chris- Worded our agreed on lab question. He did background research on delphinium, and wrote the analysis of our experimental question.

Brody- Did background research on Gypsophila, wrote our procedure, and made our phylogentic tree based on our group consensus of how the pollen was related.

Claire- Did background research on Alstroemeria, worded the hypothesis, posted and explained the sem photos, filled out the sem data spreadsheet, posted the findings of the protein sequence phylogeny  and analyzed what it showed.