User:Ian (Wiki Ed)/Content coverage/Biology


 * 1) Plant cell. It suffers from the classic problem of having too much information about specifics and not enough general information. It lacks a proper lead section, it lacks any real information about function - including the sort of general information you'd expect about water uptake. And yet it mentions phloem loading. There's a lot of different ways a student could improve that article, and it's broad enough that several students could add different (non-overlapping) aspects. If you so desired.
 * 2) I have not been able to find an overarching article on plant water relations or water movement. Though that might be too much to ask a student to create...
 * 3) The article on plasmolysis is pretty sad and lacks any references.
 * 4) Turgor pressure is even thinner and only has a single reference - from an intro biology text (Campbell). And they both suffer from the lack of a 'water relations' article to put them into context.
 * 5) The water potential article could use someone to translate it into plain English. There are lots of subsections that could use expansion, especially the soil-plant-air continuum one.
 * 6) I just discovered that there's actually a (very brief) stand-alone article on the soil-plant-air continuum.
 * 7) The osmosis article could use work, though what it really needs is a complete re-write. As it stands, themechanism section isn't written like an encylopaedia article at all and could use major improvement in tone. t could also use a lot more references.
 * 8) The osmotic pressure article, like the water potential one, could benefit from more text to complement the equations. It could also do with more references.
 * 9) The transpiration article could use some work; it's too focussed on leaves, doesn't give a whole-plant sense of things, doesn't have any connection to xylem transport, water uptake
 * 10) The stomatal conductance article is very short, very mathematical, and short on sources.
 * 11) The xylem article tries to do too much; in part that's because it was created by merging in an article on "transpirational pull". The section that was created by that merger should be a stand-alone article - probably more than one, but since it isn't, it lacks coherence. Failing that (since it's probably too much to ask of a short course like this one) that part of the article, especially the - subsection on cohesion-tension theory - could be improved, clarified, had better references added.
 * 12) The "in plants" section of the aquaporin article could probably be expanded.
 * 13) The apoplast article is very short.
 * 14) The symplast article is ever shorter; again, what we really need is an article on water movement at the whole-plant level
 * 15) There are separate, short articles on the cortex, endodermis and Casparian strip. Ideally these should be tied together with an overarching article on water movement...Sorry, I'm repeating myself. :)
 * 16) The pericycle article is very short.
 * 17) The article on sap needs a lead section.
 * 18) The membrane transport article could use some mention of plants; both this and the active transport article could also use more details of channels, pumps and transporters
 * 19) The passive transport article is very short
 * 20) The active transport article only mentions plants in passing - it could use a lot more
 * 21) Ion transporter is very short; ion channel is long, but could be expanded with plant-specific information I suspect. This template lists a number of specific kinds which I think are probably too specific, but there might be something interesting in there.
 * 22) The moisture stress article is very short. It could be developed in all kinds of different ways.
 * 23) The physiology section of the plant article says almost nothing on water. While I would normally tell students to stay away from a major article like that, I think some additions would be very helpful (if done right).
 * 24) The plant physiology article lacks a section on water relations.
 * 25) The biotic stress article could use a lot of work;
 * 26) Likewise on the abiotic stress article. In both cases, this kind of information could also be added to the main plant physiology or ecophysiology articles, with links to these ones.
 * 27) The mass flow article could use expansion, or at least correction (it currently says that water moves through mass flow in xylem).
 * 28) The article on C3 photosynthesis is short and could use expansion. (The C4 and CAM articles are longer, but not without room for improvement.)
 * 29) Carbon fixation is an overview of a lot of different reactions, but there's room for expansion in a lot of the subsections.
 * 30) The electrochemical gradient is tagged for a re-write in more easily understandable terms. There might also be some room for improvement.
 * 31) Phototroph is a large topic, but a short article.
 * 32) Photosystem I and Photosystem II could stand some improvement.
 * 33) The photosynthetically active radiation article could do with more words to balance the equations and the tables.
 * 34) The photosynthate partitioning article is very short, but could be a very large article
 * 35) This may not be on topic, but the history of C3:C4 photosynthesis research is short, but could be much longer.