Equational Relations Between Nutrient Quantities and Cellular Growth

Abstract

Summary The quantities of five nutrients (N, P, K, Mg, Ca) were estimated in enlarging maize root tip cells. When consecutive cell fresh weights were plotted against the total quantity of any one nutrient per cell a parabolic curve resulted which fits the expression: W = kXn, where W is the fresh weight per cell, X the nutrient quantity and n and k are constants. The inference that may be drawn is that, under a defined environment, cell weight and nutrient quantity are related to each other by a constant quantitative factor. Two equations are derived to support the above hypothesis and also to support a related hypothesis that there might exist a quantitative relationship between any one nutrient and all other nutrients in a given cell at any one time.