Review: Hydraulics of plant growth
John S. Boyer A and Wendy K. Silk BA College of Marine Studies and College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of Delaware, Lewes, DE 19958, USA. Corresponding author; email: boyer@cms.udel.edu
B Department of Land, Air, and Water Resources, University of California–Davis, Davis, CA 95616, USA.
Functional Plant Biology 31(8) 761-773 https://doi.org/10.1071/FP04062
Submitted: 1 April 2004 Accepted: 21 July 2004 Published: 23 August 2004
Abstract
Multicellular plants rely on growth in localised regions that contain small, undifferentiated cells and may be many millimetres from the nearest differentiated xylem and phloem. Water and solutes must move to these small cells for their growth. Increasing evidence indicates that after exiting the xylem and phloem, water and solutes are driven to the growing cells by gradients in water potential and solute potential or concentration. The gradients are much steeper than in the vascular transport system and can change in magnitude or suffer local disruption with immediate consequences for growth. Their dynamics often obscure how turgor drives wall extension for growth, and different flow paths for roots and shoots have different dynamics. In this review, the origins of the gradients, their mode of action and their consequences are discussed, with emphasis on how their dynamics affect growth processes.
Keywords: cell enlargement, growth-induced water potential, growth-sustaining water potential, osmotic potential, turgor.
Acknowledgments
We thank Missy Holbrook and Maciej Zwieniecki who organised the Harvard Forest Workshop on Long Distance Transport Processes in Plants where this review was originally presented. We also thank An-Ching Tang for help with the artwork. This work was supported by DOE grant DE-FG02–87ER13776 to JSB and NRI Competitive Grants Program/USDA grant 00–35100–9531 to WKS.
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