On Aug 10, 2005, at 9:46 AM, Lucky Pittman wrote:
I am also no specialist, but I would guess that another part of the answer is the amount of water in the tissue. I bet the tree dries itself out, increasing the concentration of other "stuff" dissolved in the sap to increase the freezing point of the remaining liquids and to decrease the damage that swelling of freezing liquids would otherwise cause. This is purely a guess, but I know that in animal cells a lot of the damage from freezing is actually mechanical damage to the cell membranes caused by swelling water and ice crystals. Ginda |
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