When I went outside to look for the subject of enquary the first thing that I noticed from the evnivorment that it was cold and winter and made to relfect on the other times we went outside for lab and how warm it use to feel outside. As I was exploring the outdoors, I saw a variety of leafs on the ground from trees outside the lab and their various colors. I picked up one of the leafs and I identified the leaf as coming from a maple tree. It was a big leaf, with a gradient of red or green coloring the leaf.
 
I know how tree begin to lose their leaves as the season changes to winter, and it has to do with the changing angle of sun and its a process in order to save on energy during as the sun spends less time in the sun, but it made me wonder what did this leaf look like under a microscope and could microcosmos help better understand the cellular process that occurs when color change occurs. What was interesting especially to me is that the color change wasn’t uniform in nature and I wondered if their was any particualr reason one part was red while other still maintain their green coloring. 
 
The microscope picture wasn’t the clearest and left alot to be desired,however there was a parts (that were not photographed) that did show some interesting differences in the coloring. While color change in leafs would be a cellular function in plants, I think that we can learn alot about energy absorption through changing in colors from dropped leafs and that in turn can lead to a study about the different organisms that go through and rely on maple tree to survive through out the year but also during the harsh winter season.



I conducted this project as part of Professor Pringle’s EEB321 class at Princeton University