大豆根尖维管组织分化和静止中心

用~3H-胸腺嘧啶核苷标记的自显影方法测定了大豆根尖的静止中心。结果表明在萌发后24小时产生,其高度为最大值,随着天数增加静止中心的高度逐渐减小。静止中心的高度与根的直径显著相关(r=0.94,p=0.01)。用显微光度计测定了静止中心细胞核的DNA 含量,大部分细胞在2c 水平,处在 G_1期。大豆根尖的静止中心与维管组织分化水平不相关,静止中心不直接控制维管组织的分化。     

GROWTH FROM THE CENTRE IN AN UMBILICATE LICHEN

The pustules on the surface of the umbilicate lichenLasallia pustulataare moved away from the centre and towards the thallus margins with an average speed of 1·8 mm per year, revealing a growth pattern organized radially and flowing from the centre of the thallus. Pustules close to the margin move substantially faster than those close to the centre; for each 10 mm added to the initial distance from the centre, the speed of outward movement is about doubled. This suggests that intercalary growth over the entire thallus is displaced outwards in an accumulating manner, accelerating the pustules. Moving away from the centre the pustules expand, often collapse in the middle, and mature by developing isidia. In the less active (senescent ?) margins the pustules are eroded away and the supplementary intercalary growth seems insufficient to keep the outflowing thallus intact. Thus the margins are disrupted into irregular lobes.     

THE ISOLATION AND CULTURE IN VITRO OF THE QUIESCENT CENTER OF ZEA MAYS

Using 3-day-old seedling roots of Zea mays L., cv. Kelvedon 33, it was possible to remove the root cap by a simple surgical manipulation without damage to the root proper. By a further small cut, the quiescent center (QC) itself was isolated. This double-convex lens-shaped tissue piece 100 X 250 μm is composed of 1000–1500 cells representing only 0.25 mm³ in volume. The explant was demonstrated unequivocally by ³H-thymidine incorporation before excision and then by autoradiography to be composed of the specific cells usually designated the quiescent center. Using sterile techniques, the QC's were placed on nutrient agar slants and allowed to grow in culture. Of a number of nutrient media tested, only a medium supplemented with organic nitrogen components, indoleacetic acid, kinetin and inorganic nutrients plus sucrose (S2M + K -2,4-D) was effective in eliciting development. Thirty to 40 percent of the 150 isolated QC's grown on this medium formed elongated roots, up to 2 cm in length in 3–4 weeks. Roots developing on agar medium showed in their proximal portion a vascular pattern with 5–6 metaxylem elements or variations of this pattern, but as the root elongated, the vascular pattern was progressively reduced in complexity at the more distal end to a small central group of metaxylem elements. When agar-grown roots were transferred after one week in culture to a liquid nutrient medium of the same composition, the initially reduced vascular pattern evident in the proximal tissues became progressively more complex in the distal portion of the root and after 2 cm of elongation, showed an essentially normal primary vascular tissue pattern characteristic of the seedling root.     

THE ULTRASTRUCTURE OF THE QUIESCENT CENTER IN THE APEX OF CULTURED ROOTS OF CONVOLVULUS ARVENSIS L.

Cultured roots of the common bindweed, Convolvulus arvensis L. growing at the rate of 15–30 mm/day in sterile nutrient medium were fixed for electron microscopic analysis. The ultrastructure of the quiescent center, the initials of the ground meristem, and the initials of the procambium were studied in order to determine whether sequential structural changes could be correlated with models for specifying the mechanisms by which cell differentiation and cell division might be controlled. The differentiation of cells in the root proper occurs very gradually in linear files from the site of the quiescent center proximally into the different tissue regions. Major structural changes, such as the orientation and subsequent elongation of cells along the longitudinal axis of the root and cell wall changes, indicate that the control of differentiation and perhaps cell division occurs in radial gradients outwardly from the quiescent center.     

THE QUIESCENT CENTER IN CULTURED ROOTS OF CONVOLVULUS ARVENSIS L.

Cultured roots of Convolvulus arvensis were incubated in 0.2–0.3 μc/ml methyl-³H-thymidine for different intervals of time. In roots supplied with tritiated thymidine for 12 hr, 14 hr, 48 hr, or 14 hr followed by transfer to fresh medium for 24 hr, autoradiographs prepared of serial, longitudinal sections of the root tips showed the presence of a subterminal quiescent center in the root proper at the distal poles of the central cylinder and cortex. In addition, a zone of unlabelled cells in the columella, distal to the root cap initials, was present. In roots supplied continuously with tritiated thymidine for 64 hr, 96 hr, and 120 hr, the quiescent center was either reduced in size or was not present.     

THYMINE IN THE ACID-SOLUBLE FRACTION OF ARBACIA EGGS

Mature Arbacia eggs were extracted with cold dilute perchloric acid, the extract concentrated, and the concentrate digested in hot perchloric acid. Thymine was recovered from the digest by paper chromatography, and the amount per egg found to be about 5 times the amount per sperm. This was the amount expected from previous experiments and is believed to represent all or almost all of the thymine in the egg. The result supports previous observations that DNA is absent from the mature egg although present in the nucleus of the egg in the germinal vesicle stage. No thymine could be recovered from a similar extract of 5,000 times as many sperm of the same species. The observations are consistent with the theory that DNA and its derivatives act as metabolic antagonists of the corresponding ribose compounds.     

THE GROWTH OF BACTERIOPHAGE

1. An anti-Escherichia coli phage has been isolated and its behavior studied. 2. A plaque counting method for this phage is described, and shown to give a number of plaques which is proportional to the phage concentration. The number of plaques is shown to be independent of agar concentration, temperature of plate incubation, and concentration of the suspension of plating bacteria. 3. The efficiency of plating, i.e. the probability of plaque formation by a phage particle, depends somewhat on the culture of bacteria used for plating, and averages around 0.4. 4. Methods are described to avoid the inactivation of phage by substances in the fresh lysates. 5. The growth of phage can be divided into three periods: adsorption of the phage on the bacterium, growth upon or within the bacterium (latent period), and the release of the phage (burst). 6. The rate of adsorption of phage was found to be proportional to the concentration of phage and to the concentration of bacteria. The rate constant k_a is 1.2 x 10^–9 cm.⁸/min. at 15°C. and 1.9 x 10^–9 cm.⁸/min. at 25°. 7. The average latent period varies with the temperature in the same way as the division period of the bacteria. 8. The latent period before a burst of individual infected bacteria varies under constant conditions between a minimal value and about twice this value. 9. The average latent period and the average burst size are neither increased nor decreased by a fourfold infection of the bacteria with phage. 10. The average burst size is independent of the temperature, and is about 60 phage particles per bacterium. 11. The individual bursts vary in size from a few particles to about 200. The same variability is found when the early bursts are measured separately, and when all the bursts are measured at a late time.     

THE LIGHT GROWTH RESPONSE AND THE GROWTH SYSTEM OF PHYCOMYCES

1. The Roscoe-Bunsen law holds for the light growth response of Phycomyces if the time component of stimulation is short. With exposures longer than a few seconds, the reaction time to light is determined by the intensity and not by the energy of the flash. 2. The possible nature of the very long latency in the response to light is considered in terms of the structure of the cell and its mechanism of growth. It is suggested that during the latency some substance produced by light in the protoplasm is transported centrifugally to the cell wall or outermost layer of protoplasm. 3. The total elongation occurring over a period of 1 to 2 hours is independent of flashes of light or temporary darkening. Light acts by facilitating some change already under way in the growth system, and during the principal phase of elongation is not a necessary or limiting factor for growth. 4. Judged by the reaction time, the original sensitivity is restored in the light system following exposure to light in about one-third the time required for equilibrium to be reattained in the growth system.     

THE PRENATAL GROWTH OF THE MOUSE

1. The general course of prenatal growth in the mouse, the guinea pig, and the chick can be expressed by straight line relations between the logarithms of the weight and age only when age is counted from the beginning of the embryo proper. 2. This is interpreted as showing that the manner of growth before the beginning of the embryo proper is essentially different from that after this time. 3. The velocity constants for the animals mentioned are similar; the major differences in their curves depend on the amount of tissue involved in the first organization of the embryo proper and in the length of prenatal life. 4. Growth of different animals may be compared more accurately if, instead of either birth age or conception age, embryo age is used.     

THE NATURE OF THE GROWTH RATE

1. The growth rate of organisms may be considered as a chemical reaction which gives the mature organism as its end-product. The organism grows at a definite rate which is, at any moment, proportional to the amount of growth yet to be made. 2. Shoots of young pear trees measured at weekly intervals during the growing season showed a rate similar to that of an autocatalytic reaction. 3. Young walnut trees showed distinct cycles of growth in a single season, but the growth in each cycle proceeded at a rate corresponding to an autocatalytic reaction. 4. The growth rate follows a definite, quantitative course though judged by different criteria. Data are presented for maize in which green weight, dry weight, and height of the plant are used. Data for cattle show that either weight or height of the animal may be used as a criterion.