There is considerable disagreement as to whether or not water is equally available to plants in drying soil over the entire range from field capacity to wilting percentage. Some workers have repeatedly stated that water is equally available over this range (5, 18, 23, 24) while considerable data have accumulated which indicate that physiological processes in plants are altered as a result of de...

Plant roots constantly secrete compounds into the soil to interact with neighboring organisms presumably to gain certain functional advantages at different stages of development. Accordingly, it has been hypothesized that the phytochemical composition present in the root exudates changes over the course of the lifespan of a plant. Here, root exudates of in vitro grown Arabidopsis plants were co...

Aluminum (Al) toxicity is a major factor limiting plant growth in acid soils. Elevated atmospheric CO2 [CO2] enhances plant growth. However, there is no report on the effect of elevated [CO2] on growth of plant genotypes differing in Al tolerance grown in acid soils. We investigated the effect of short-term elevated [CO2] on growth of Al-tolerant (ET8) and Al-sensitive (ES8) wheat plants and ma...

Pain, redness, heat, and swelling are hallmarks of inflammation that were recognized as early as the first century AD. Despite these early observations, the mechanisms responsible for swelling, in particular, remained an enigma for nearly two millennia. Only in the past century have scientists and physicians gained an appreciation for the role that vascular endothelium plays in controlling the ...

BACKGROUND TNFalpha may contribute to the pathophysiology of airway inflammation. For example, we have recently shown that nasal administration of TNFalpha produces late phase co-appearance of granulocyte and plasma exudation markers on the mucosal surface. The objective of the present study was to examine indices of granulocyte presence and activity in response to intranasal TNFalpha challenge...

Background and Purpose—Recent studies have shown that selective inhibition of specific subsets of intercellular adhesion molecules protects the brain during ischemia. We studied selective inhibition of integrin v 3 with cyclo [Arg-GlyAsp-D-Phe-Val] (cRGDfV) in the rat middle cerebral artery occlusion model (MCAO). Methods—Rats were treated before and after MCAO with cRGDfV. Physiological parame...

BACKGROUND Allergen induced early phase airway response and airway plasma exudation are predominantly mediated by inflammatory mast cell mediators including histamine, cysteinyl leukotrienes (cysLTs) and thromboxane A2 (TXA2). The aim of the present study was to evaluate whether repeated allergen exposure affects early phase airway response to allergen challenge. METHODS A trimellitic anhydri...