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Updated: Oct 1, 2025

The Infiltration-centrifugation Technique for Extraction of Apoplastic Fluid from Plant Leaves Using Phaseolus vulgaris as an Example
Published on: December 19, 2014
An update on passive transport in and out of plant cells
Melissa Tomkins1, Aoife Hughes1, Richard J Morris1
1Computational and Systems Biology, John Innes Centre, Norwich Research Park, NR4 7UH Norwich, UK.
Abstract:
Transport across membranes is critical for plant survival. Membranes are the interfaces at which plants interact with their environment. The transmission of energy and molecules into cells provides plants with the source material and power to grow, develop, defend, and move. An appreciation of the physical forces that drive transport processes is thus important for understanding the plant growth and development. We focus on the passive transport of molecules, describing the fundamental concepts and demonstrating how different levels of abstraction can lead to different interpretations of the driving forces. We summarize recent developments on quantitative frameworks for describing diffusive and bulk flow transport processes in and out of cells, with a more detailed focus on plasmodesmata, and outline open questions and challenges.
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