Abstract
Many compounds acting as regulators in plants are substances insoluble in water. The examples here are steroid compounds of the brassinosteroid group. In biological experiments, where they are exogenously supplied to plants, brassinosteroids are first dissolved in organic solvents such as alcohols or DMSO. These experiments should include appropriate controls, as many research results indicate that alcohols, e.g., methanol or ethanol, are not free of effect on the metabolism in plant cells. In this chapter, examples of experiments on brassinosteroid activity in plants show the significance of using two kinds of controls (absolute ones and ones with a hormone solvent) for the interpretation of results concerning the permeability of cell membranes in oilseed rape leaves during low-temperature stress, changes in protein content in wheat grains, etc. Attention is also paid to the combined effect of exogenous brassinosteroids and ethanol (which is present in trace quantities in aqueous solutions used to treat plants) on brassinosteroid management inside plants. The physiological effects caused by brassinosteroids are thought to depend on many factors (i.e. environmental conditions of plant growth). This chapter shows how the use of different controls may lead to problems in interpretation, and be another factor contributing to the nonreproducibility and/or ambiguity of the results obtained.
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Janeczko, A. (2011). The significance of ethanol as a hormone solvent in experiments on the physiological activity of brassinosteroids. In: Hayat, S., Ahmad, A. (eds) Brassinosteroids: A Class of Plant Hormone. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0189-2_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0189-2_13
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