An amino acid controls plants' breath
Tuesday, December 6, 2016 - 12:01
in Biology & Nature
Plants breathe and "sweat" through stomata, microscopic pores found on leaves, stems and other plant organs. Through the stomata, plants take up carbon dioxide for photosynthesis and breathe out the products of this process, oxygen and water vapor. Group leader Dr. June M. KWAK and his colleagues at the Center for Plant Aging Research, within the Institute for Basic Science (IBS), identified a novel calcium channel and found out how it regulates stomatal closure. Published in Cell Reports, this discovery helps to clarify how plants maintain and adjust an adequate intracellular calcium level for their growth and breathing.