Preliminary Course.
Eco-Physiology
Preliminary Notions
Factors affecting plant growth
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Plant growth results from both endogenous processes and environmental factors.
- The endogenous process: plant structure establishment
- Environmental factors
The plant structure establishment strategy arises from endogenous processes.
The differentiation and production of various organs can be expressed from rules applied to successive metamers.
Environmental factors such as water, mineral nutrients, CO2 and light are resources;
their supply availability affects plant growth, and thus determines organ sizes.
Temperature affects growth.
In most plants, the structure development steps are governed by the thermal energy received.
Temperature thus affects the rate of structure development and light affects biomass accumulation.