VOLUME XLIX NUMBER 6 
BOTANICAL GAZETTE 
JUNE 1910 
THE EFFECT OF SOME TOXIC SOLUTIONS ON MITOSIS 
WARNER W. STOCKBERGER 
(WITH SEVEN TEXT FIGURES) 
During the two decades just past there has arisen a considerable 
body of literature from the researches which have been made upon the 
physiology of the cell under the influence of various external conditions. 
The effect of certain stimuli on the growth and form of the organism 
and the modifications in the normal processes of cell and nuclear 
division induced thereby have been made the basis of numerous 
generalizations with respect to cellular activities. 
Owing to its bearing upon questions of general and practical 
interest, the action of toxic substances on the growth of plants has 
been widely investigated. Notwithstanding this fact, our knowledge 
of the effect of such substances on cellular development in phanero- 
gams is far from extensive, and the nature of toxicity itself yet lacks 
a Satisfactory explanation. What may be called the modern epoch 
of the toxicity studies began with the researches of KAHLENBERG and 
TRUE (10), in which the action of chemically equivalent solutions 
of substances experimented with were for the first time compared. 
According to the accounts of a number of writers, various depar- 
tures from the normal course of nuclear and cell division have been 
caused experimentally by the action of solutions of various chemical 
constitution. The technic of this type of investigation was first 
developed by Grrassrmow in the study of the cells of thallophytes, 
and later adapted to the study of higher forms. 
Numerous investigators have studied the action of ether, chloro- 
form, chloral hydrate, potassium nitrate, phenol, benzol, and copper 
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