PLACE OF PLANT PHYSIOLOGY 7 



there exist special studies connecting physiology with systematic 

 botany and with morphology, where both phases of the work are 

 equally emphasized. 



Plant geography which considers the distribution of species 

 as determined by heat, illumination, moisture, etc., is thus a 

 connecting link between ecology and systematic botany. In a 

 similar manner experimental morphology, which attempts to show 

 the relations existing between form and function, is obviously 

 a connecting link between the great divisions of physiology and 

 morphology. 



Applied Botany. — Turning now to the applied phases of 

 botany, we see that plants are studied with a view to improving 

 man's condition in six large fields, — agriculture, domestic science, 

 forestry, medicine, brewing, and landscape architecture. Agricul- 

 ture is largely concerned with the increasing of the world's supply 

 of food and clothing. This requires a consideration of animals as 

 well as plants but, since all food and most textiles come directly or 

 indirectly from plants, as will be shown in Chapter III, agriculture 

 is primarily a botanical science. To date there are five branches 

 of agriculture which deal with plants, viz., agronomy, bacteriology, 

 genetics, horticulture, and plant pathology. 



Domestic science, which is concerned with the maintenance and 

 care of the home, contains two divisions that are especially con- 

 cerned with plant forms, — baking and food conservation. Since 

 the yeast organism used in baking is a plant and since the causes 

 of food decay are mostly micro-plants, it is easy to see that we 

 are here concerned with botanical sciences. 



Forestry is the science which deals with the production, con- 

 servation, and use of the world's supply of wood. Since wood 

 is produced only by plants, forestry is a botanical science. Its 

 divisions, silviculture and wood technology, are defined along 

 with those of agriculture in the -summarized outline at the end 

 of this chapter. 



Medicine is the science of keeping the human body in good 

 health and in the best possible condition. Inasmuch as at the 

 present time man's greatest enemies are the pathogenic bacteria, 

 and since at least 75% of the curative medicines administered 

 are derived from plants, it is easy to see that medicine is indirectly, 

 if not directly, a botanical science. Two of its divisions, — bacteri- 

 ology and pharmacognosy — are directly concerned with botany. 



