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Question 41

The spongy mesophyll of a leaf is full of air spaces between its cells. What are those spaces for?

  1. They store oxygen for the plant to use during the night
  2. They make the leaf light enough to be held up by its stalk
  3. They store the water that the leaf uses for photosynthesis
  4. They let gases move freely through the inside of the leafCorrect answer

Explanation

Gases have to reach every photosynthesising cell and get away again, and an open network of spaces inside the leaf lets them diffuse between those cells and the pores of the surface. The night-store idea comes from imagining that a plant only needs gases after dark, whereas gases are moving in and out of a leaf the whole time.

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Question 41: The spongy mesophyll of a leaf is full of air spaces… · Plants and Photosynthesis · Questena