Sniffing Out Ethylene In the previous post I summarized the latest information on how the plant hormone ethylene is made (at least in the model plant Arabidopsis). Though most people are familiar with the plant hormone ethylene mainly because of its effects on fruit ripening, the list of plant responses…
C’est un gaz. Es un gas. Es ist ein gas. It’s a Gas! If you are familiar with the gaseous plant hormone ethylene, it’s most likely because of its ability to promote fruit ripening in apples, bananas, tomatoes, etc.. Ethylene also affects many other aspects of a plant’s life cycle,…
Fried Green Tomatoes About this time of year in the North Temperate Zone people may be getting very tired of fried green tomatoes and green tomato pie. As a plant physiologist, I was often asked how to ripen green tomatoes. (Rather than go into this here, I’ll refer you to…
What Do Suburban Lawns and the Vietnam War Have in Common? Answer: The herbicide 2,4-D. You may be familiar with this herbicide as an active ingredient in “Weed ‘n Feed®”, “Weed B Gon MAX®”, Turf Builder® With Weed Control”, etc.. During the Vietnam War, it was an active ingredient in…
As previously mentioned….if most climatologists are correct, then parts of the Earth’s surface may experience increasing episodes of heat and drought as a result of global “weirding”. (see here and here and here for recent examples) Some of the effects of heat on photosynthesis were considered in part 1 of…
The Power of Movement in Plants Most of a flowering plant’s development and physiology is regulated by plant hormones. The first of these chemical signals to be isolated and characterized was auxin. In the 1930’s, after the initial discovery of auxin by Frits Went in 1928, he, Kenneth Thimann, and…
What do a fungal disease of rice, dwarf plants, flowering, and beer have in common? Answer: They all may involve the action of the plant hormone gibberellin, a.k.a. gibberellic acid (GA). Let me explain….. This plant hormone was first discovered by Japanese scientists working on a rice disease called bakanae…