Multicellular Plants Research Articles

CHANGES IN INTERCELLULAR RELATIONSHIPS DURING THE GROWTH AND DIFFERENTIATION OF LIVING PLANT TISSUES

CHANGES IN INTERCELLULAR RELATIONSHIPS DURING THE GROWTH AND DIFFERENTIATION OF LIVING PLANT TISSUES

The Plant Commonwealth and its Mode of Government

THE plant commonwealth lies within the contours of an individual plant? rose, lily, grass, oak tree or any other. The physical features of the commonwealth have been surveyed and are well known. Notwithstanding their differences in outward aspect, all the members of the commonwealth?root, stem, leaves, and flowers?own a common plan of organisation. As the human being is the unit of a commonwealth of nations, so is the cell or protoplast the unit of the plant commonwealth. Just as certain men have the appearance of simplicity, so has the plant cell?a minute mass of nucleated cytoplasm, bounded by a solid wall of cell-wall substance, of such small dimensions that one thousand cells might lie comfortably side by side along the diameter of a penny piece. Yet, as is the case with man, the simplicity of the cell is illusory. The cell lives, feeds, respires, grows, and does many different kinds of work. Nor does it live unto itself alone. In all its manifold activities the cell influences and is influenced by other of the well-nigh innumerable cell units of the commonwealth. Indeed, the messages which by word of mouth, by post and telephone, telegraph and wireless, pass between members of our own commonwealth and leave us but little peace, are rare by comparison with those sent and received by the living cells of plants. Throughout life they are always “listening in.” In the simplest plants of all?the unicellular plants?the cell is the commonwealth. So is it in the highest (multicellular) plant at the moment of the rebirth of the individual within the ovary of the flower of the mother-plant. All plants begin life each as a single, minute mass of semi-fluid nucleated protoplasm. Every activity evinced by this living particle shows alike the diversity of its unrecognisable parts and the integrity, that is, the individuality of the whole, and throughout life diversity of activity and oneness or individuality alike persist.

(1) Immunity in Infective Diseases (2) The inflammation Idea in General Pathology (3) The Milroy Lectures on Epidemic Disease in England The Evidence of Variability and of Persistency of Type (4) Microbiologie Agricole

(1) ATHOLOGISTS will welcome this translation of Prof. Metchnikoff's great work on immunity, containing as it does the results of twenty years work devoted to the subject. Commencing with some introductory remarks on the importance of immunity, the author passes on to review the phenomena of immunity in unicellular animals and in multicellular plants; the resorption of formed elements and of albumenoid fluids in animals, instances and mechanism of natural immunity against micro-organisms, the problems of acquired immunity against micro-organisms and immunity against toxins, and the comparative immunhy of the skin and mucous membranes to microbial attacks. A chapter on protective vaccinations, and another giving a useful summary of the whole subject and an historical sketch of our knowledge of immunity conclude the volume. (1) Immunity in Infective Diseases. By Prof. Elie Metchnikoff. Translated from the French by Francis G. Binnie. Pp. xvi + 591. (Cambridge: University Press, 1905.) Price 18s. net. (2) The inflammation Idea in General Pathology. By Dr. W. H. Ransom Pp. vi + 354. (London: Williams and Norgate, 1905.) Price 7s. 6d. (3) The Milroy Lectures on Epidemic Disease in England. The Evidence of Variability and of Persistency of Type. By Dr. W. H. Hamer. Pp. 72. (London: Printed at the Bedford Press, 20 and 21 Bedfordbury, W.C., 1906.) (4) Microbiologie Agricole. By Dr. Edmond Kayser. Pp. xii + 439. (Paris: Librairie J. B. Bailli`re et Fils.) Price 5 francs.