STUDIES IN THE PHYSIOLOGY OF FOREST TREES. IV. MOISTURE MOVEMENT IN DECAPITATED STEMS

Greenidge , K. N. H. (Dalhousie U., Halifax, Nova Scotia.) Studies in the physiology of forest trees. IV. Moisture movement in decapitated stems. Amer. Jour. Bot. 47(10) : 816–819. Illus. 1960.—The rates and patterns of moisture movement in large, decapitated ring-porous stems have been investigated with the aid of water-soluble dyes injected into the lower boles of standing trees. A few observations have been made also in diffuse-porous trees treated in the same manner. Movement has been found to continue to the very apices of the stubs of oak and elm stems in the complete absence of foliar surfaces. Similar results were obtained in untouched stubs, and in stubs, the sawn surfaces of which were shellacked following decapitation and prior to injection. In oak and elm thus treated, maximum rates of movement approached 1/2 the velocities characteristic of entire stems. In shellacked and unshellacked stubs injected 20–24 hr. after decapitation, rates of movement, although commensurable, were further decreased. The relative distance moved by the stain varied on occasion in ash, and rates of movement dropped markedly in this species following decapitation. Similarly, speeds of travel were much reduced in diffuse-porous species following detopping.     

Electron Microscopy of Solitary and Aggregated Slime Mould Cells

Polysphondylium violaceum and Dictyostelium discoideum myxamoebae have simple double-layered nuclear membranes, a cytoplasmic reticulum of particle-covered membranes, and small mitochondria consisting of convoluted tubules tightly packed in double membranes. In addition to objects still recognisable as bacteria, their food vacuoles contain concentric (or spiral) membranes, apparently formed secondarily from undigested material; these are ultimately ejected. Where the triple-layered plasma membranes (~70 A wide) of cells in the early aggregates are apposed to one another, they run parallel but separated by a layer of rather constant thickness (~200 A), as in many unspecialised metazoan tissues. Thus studies on slime moulds may well increase our understanding of cell adhesion and tissue formation in metazoa.