Speaker: Roger Pearce, School of Biology, Newcastle University
Location: Ridley building 1.63
Time/Date: 10th February 2010, 16:00
My colleagues are due some account of what I have been doing all these years, and freezing stress is an important part of that. Also, I am interested in the process of acclimation to stresses including freezing, and knowing the nature and consequences of freezing makes this easier to understand. Freezing in plants brings biological, physical and chemical principles together; I will partly cover the principles. I hope this will be interesting for anyone interested in any aspect of stress in any organism. Also, I will show a lot of images that help us understand freezing stress, particularly using infra-red imaging to detect the initiation of freezing and the spread of ice, also freeze-fracture and low temperature scanning electron microscopy to show ice distribution in organs and consequent cellular collapse. This shows that in many species the most important effect of freezing is cellular desiccation, caused by the extracellular growth of ice. There are broadly two strategies that could be used to improve plant survival of freezing; one by preventing or controlling freezing; the other by controlling its consequences, particularly desiccation. The former may help, but in the long term the latter may be the more important and tractable in plants.
Host: G Wright
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Dr Roger Pearce
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Published: 25th January 2010