Green light regulates plastid gene transcription and stimulates the accumulation of photosynthetic pigments in plants

Abstract

Light is a key environmental factor regulating the growth and development of plants. The regulatory and photosynthetic roles of light depend on its intensity and spectral composition. The red and blue spectral regions are characterized by a high physiological activity [1]. Many researchers consider green light to be rather inactive part of solar radiation. This point of view is based mainly on the fact that the leaves of the majority of plants are green and, therefore, plants rather reflect green light than use it as a source of energy. However, some studies of Russian and foreign researchers revealed a special regulatory role of green light. It is obvious that the ratio between different wavelengths of the incident light flux serves as a signal initiating one or another development program and determines the light adaptation of plants. An impor� tant role of the ratio between green and farred light in the manifestation of the shadow avoidance syndrome was shown in 1952 by Borthwick [2], whereas the same effect determined by the balance between green and blue light was revealed only two years ago by Sellaro et al. [3] and Zhang et al. [4].