Subject: How do plants know they are dead?

From: [email-masked] (Chris Jones)
Date: Thu, 13 Jul 1995 13:10:50

Hello,
          Just an odd query. When can you say that a plant is dead and at what 
point does a plant realise? What I am getting at is that I am interested in 
getting mRNA from plant tissue and when you use animal tissue as soon as the 
animal or tissue is "dead" the mRNA begins to decay so you plunge the material 
into lq N2 asap. Do I need to do that with plants (developing seeds actually)? 
or am I OK untill a critical level of water/sugars etc.etc is reached. 
Anything which would prevent me having to lug a tank of lqN2 into a field!

Many Thanks....

Chris Jones

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From: [email-masked] (Lowell Zelinski)
Date: Thu, 13 Jul 1995 15:53:14 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
[email-masked] (Chris Jones) wrote:

> point does a plant realise? 

Does a plant "realize" thats its alive ??

What I am getting at is that I am interested in

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From: [email-masked] (Wayne Scharf)
Date: 15 Jul 1995 16:58:37 -0700

>Anything which would prevent me having to lug a tank of lqN2 into a field!

Put the LN2 is a big thermos....lasts most of the day... use a vented 
stopper, of course...
-- 
[email-masked]
Silverado

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From: Gary Poyssick <[email-masked]>
Date: 19 Jul 1995 13:54:29 GMT

I don't know if they know they're dead, but they sure know if they're 
dying. Orchids will flower out of season, for example, in an attempt to 
regenerate the species. Others will form keikis (babies) at the base to 
do the same thing. Very interesting eh? How do they know?