ABSTRACT
Also unique to the buds and xylem tissues of several species of tem perate woody plants is the ability to avoid freezing stress by deep supercooling. A comprehensive list of woody species that exhibit this trait has been presented by George et al. (1982). During a deep super cooling event, cellular water remains liquid within cells at very low temperatures by remaining isolated from heterogeneous ice nuclei and the nucleating effect of extracellular ice. Supercooled water is in a metastable condition and will form intracellular ice in response to a het erogeneous nucleation event or when the homogeneous nucleation tem perature (—38°C) of water is reached. A general review of this topic will also be presented.
