Morning Mitoses

Your story about Dr. Kay1 and plant rhythms reminded me of a story my botany professor told us about his MS research. The year was 1950.He was looking for growth periods in tomatoes and decided that he would look for mitotic figures in the hair root tips, where they should be abundant. He spent many hours during the afternoon, evening, then morning but found next to nothing. So he decided to check every hour on the hour starting at midnight. Between 3:00 and 4:00 am the root tips were loaded wit

Written byCharles Gaush

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Your story about Dr. Kay¹ and plant rhythms reminded me of a story my botany professor told us about his MS research. The year was 1950.

He was looking for growth periods in tomatoes and decided that he would look for mitotic figures in the hair root tips, where they should be abundant. He spent many hours during the afternoon, evening, then morning but found next to nothing. So he decided to check every hour on the hour starting at midnight. Between 3:00 and 4:00 am the root tips were loaded with mitoses. Very interesting.

Charles R. Gaush, PhD

Medical Microbiologist, Retired crgaush@myactv.net

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