NON-HORMONAL STIMULATORS AND INHIBITORS OF PLANT GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT

1. Plants contain growth regulators that are non-hormonal in nature. These regulators change in concentration during ontogeny and when applied exogenously, can either stimulate or depress growth. While the bulk of either the phenolic or terpenoid regulators are localized within the vacuole, they can also be found within other cellular compartments where they may act upon metabolic pathways, modifying either cell multiplication or elongation. 2. Non-hormonal growth regulators may affect the synthesis and/or destruction of phytohormones, mainly indole-3-acetic acid (IAA). These regulators behave non-specifically, modifying the actions of auxins, gibberellins and cytokinins upon growth. 3. A variety of both uncertainties and unresolved contradictions exist that have prevented a thorough elucidation of the mechanisms of actions of both phenolic and terpenoid regulators. These uncertainties and unresolved contradictions include lack of data regarding compartmentalization of many of the inhibitors. This raises the question of whether their intracellular concentrations become elevated sufficiently to affect metabolic pathways in vivo. Exogenously applied regulators of non-hormonal nature usually interfere with growth only at high concentrations. Therefore, the possibility cannot be excluded that under these conditions, reactions occur within the cell that are absent in vivo. 4. The specific properties of natural non-hormonal regulators are similar in certain respects to phytohormones. For example, both of them may be biogenetically bound within metabolic centres: shikimate (phenolics, indoles, alkaloids), bi-benzi (coumarins) or acetate-mevalonate (terpenoids, fluorens, sesquiterpenes, cytokinins). In addition, both non-hormonal regulators and phytohormones exhibit biological activity in growth bioassays. 5. Non-hormonal regulators may possess a number of useful purposes, e.g. test substances such as fusicoccin permit the investigation of the mode of action of phytohormones, specific inhibitors blocking special forms of growth and protectors of phytohormone activity in culture.