Ion‐selective Microelectrodes: Their Use and Importance in Modern Plant Cell Biology

The exact ion gradients across cellular membranes and their changes due to metabolic or transport processes can be best studied with the use of ion‐selective microelectrodes. The last decade of research using ion‐selective microelectrodes in intact cells has proven this technique to be indispensable for the investigation of a variety of physiological questions of regulatory processes, membrane transport, cellular signalling, developmental biology and plant nutrition. Their application to selected problems has led to numerous exciting observations, many of which have changed our view concerning cellular responses to environmental stimuli and in many instances have led to a new understanding of plant cell physiology. Since, with these electrodes, intracellular as well as extracellular free ion concentrations can be simultaneously detected with electrical transport parameters such as membrane potential and membrane conductance, they can be powerful tools in the hands of many plant cell biologists.