Importance
Root pressure can transport water and dissolved mineral nutrients from roots through the xylem to the tops of relatively short plants when transpiration is low or zero. The maximum root pressure measured is about 0.6 megapascals but some species never generate any root pressure. The main contributor to the movement of water and mineral nutrients upward in vascular plants is considered to be the transpirational pull. However, sunflower plants grown in 100% relative humidity grew normally and accumulated the same amount of mineral nutrients as plants in normal humidity, which had a transpiration rate 10 to 15 times the plants in 100% humidity. Thus, transpiration may not be as important in upward mineral nutrient transport in relatively short plants as often assumed.
Xylem vessels sometimes empty over winter. Root pressure may be important in refilling the xylem vessels. However, in some species vessels refill without root pressure.
Root pressure is often high in some deciduous trees before they leaf out. Transpiration is minimal without leaves, and organic solutes are being mobilized so decrease the xylem water potential. Sugar maple accumulates high concentrations of sugars in its xylem early in the spring, which is the source of maple sugar. Some trees "bleed" xylem sap profusely when their stems are pruned in late winter or early spring, e.g. maple and elm. Such bleeding is similar to root pressure only sugars, rather than ions, may lower the xylem water potential. In the unique case of maple trees, sap bleeding is caused by changes in stem pressure and not root pressure.
Read more about this topic: Root Pressure
Famous quotes containing the word importance:
“When will the world learn that a million men are of no importance compared with one man?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“More than ten million women march to work every morning side by side with the men. Steadily the importance of women is gaining not only in the routine tasks of industry but in executive responsibility. I include also the woman who stays at home as the guardian of the welfare of the family. She is a partner in the job and wages. Women constitute a part of our industrial achievement.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“We have been told over and over about the importance of bonding to our children. Rarely do we hear about the skill of letting go, or, as one parent said, “that we raise our children to leave us.” Early childhood, as our kids gain skills and eagerly want some distance from us, is a time to build a kind of adult-child balance which permits both of us room.”
—Joan Sheingold Ditzion (20th century)