Concluding Remarks. ib'j 



Chapter VIII. 



Concluding Remarks, 



In the preceding pages we have attempted to give the outlines 

 of one the most fundamental prohlems of plant physiology. The 

 subject has been attacked from many different points of view and 

 by many different methods, but in our opinion the main interest is 

 not centred in the achievements of any individual investigator. 

 What, in our opinion, is the most important aspect which presents 

 itself in reviewing the facts obtained in recent investigations on 

 carbon assimilation, is the prospect of the development of a new 

 phase of science. This is the prospect that plant physiology is 

 developing into an exact science, utilising the experiences of the 

 fundamental sciences, physics and chemistry, but nevertheless a 

 science, exact and independent, with its own working principles and 

 methods, directing and stimulating the development of the applied 

 sciences, agriculture and horticulture. No prophetic vision is 

 needed to foretell that developments in agriculture and horticulture 

 will follow development in plant physiology as great as those 

 which were produced by physics and chemistry in engineering and 

 other technical sciences. 



But such development can only take place if we learn from the 

 past what are likely to be the limitations to successful development. 



The present state of the subject is the result of a number of 

 independent investigations, the bearing of which on one another 

 is rather accidental than designed, and in this lack of co-ordination 

 is to be found a reason for the slow development of the subject 

 hitherto. It is clear that the only way to attain a reasonable rate 

 of progress is to institute a much closer and more intimate co- 

 operation between scientific workers attacking the same problems 

 from different points of view and by different methods. 



It is generally desirable in a review of this nature to conclude 

 with a brief summary of the present position of the subject. In the 

 case of carbon assimilation it seems to us that it is not so much the 

 complete array of experimental facts obtained in the various 

 researches which is of importance, but the general principles which 

 become clear from a consideration of the whole subject. This is 

 especially so as the subject is in a more or less mobile condition and 

 development and ever-widening scope must follow along sound 

 lines of work based on the principles of the subject. 



