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Protoplasmic Streaming

  • Chapter
Transport in Plants I

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of Plant Physiology ((PLANT,volume 1))

Abstract

After Hartig’s discovery of the sieve tube in 1837 and his later researches (1858a, b) that established the importance of the phloem as the tissue containing a rich organic sap, plant physiologists were firmly convinced that this was the channel in which the “elaborated sap” formed by the leaves was exported throughout the plant. It seems that from 1860 to 1885 they were content to believe that the mechanism of movement of the nutrients in the phloem was by diffusion down a gradient of concentration. De Vries (1885) states: “Following the prevailing view, initiated and developed by Sachs about the movement of organic nutrients in plants, the most general cause of this movement was considered to be diffusion. Consumption of each substance by growth and metabolism, and a corresponding enrichment in particular cells and organs determine the direction in which the movement goes, while the transfer itself is generally a diffusive one.” He firmly points out that this is quantitatively quite untenable, that diffusion would take two years and seven months to transfer a milligram of sugar through a distance of one meter of pure water from a 10% source solution, and that this cannot conceivably be the basis of long-distance transport. Even when the gradient of sugar concentration is established the transfer of a mg through a cm2 would take six days. He argues instead in favor of the streaming motions observable in protoplasm as a more credible mechanism and studied fresh phloem to see to what extent such motions occurred there and whether the speeds of motion provided the necessary acceleration.

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Authors
  1. M. J. Canny
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Harvard University, Harvard Forest, Petersham, MA, 01366, USA

    M. H. Zimmermann

  2. Department of Botany, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, G 12 8QQ, Great Britain

    J. A. Milburn

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© 1975 Springer-Verlag Berlin · Heidelberg

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Canny, M.J. (1975). Protoplasmic Streaming. In: Zimmermann, M.H., Milburn, J.A. (eds) Transport in Plants I. Encyclopedia of Plant Physiology, vol 1. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-66161-7_12

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-66161-7_12

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-66163-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-66161-7

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