Cell wall is a dead metaphor.
Biomechanics
Cell wall
Hugo de Vries
Metaphor
Plasmolysis
Robert Hooke
Journal
Journal of plant physiology
ISSN: 1618-1328
Titre abrégé: J Plant Physiol
Pays: Germany
ID NLM: 9882059
Informations de publication
Date de publication:
Nov 2023
Nov 2023
Historique:
received:
07
09
2023
revised:
17
09
2023
accepted:
17
09
2023
medline:
6
11
2023
pubmed:
1
10
2023
entrez:
30
9
2023
Statut:
ppublish
Résumé
It was recently suggested to end the usage of the term cell wall in microbiology (including prokaryotes and fungi) because it represented an inappropriate and potentially misleading metaphor (Casadevall and Gow, 2022). The analysis of the arguments for such a move from the viewpoint of the plant physiologist indicates that the suggestion is based on misunderstandings, first, of the early history of cell biology and its terminology; second, of the development of modern concepts of cell wall function since the late 19th century; and third, of the nature of metaphors and their role in scientific communication. We conclude that misconceptions concerning cell walls may arise due to pedagogical shortcomings in introducing students to our technical terminology rather than from the fact that part of this terminology originated from metaphors.
Identifiants
pubmed: 37776572
pii: S0176-1617(23)00193-1
doi: 10.1016/j.jplph.2023.154099
pii:
doi:
Types de publication
Journal Article
Langues
eng
Sous-ensembles de citation
IM
Pagination
154099Informations de copyright
Copyright © 2023 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.
Déclaration de conflit d'intérêts
Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.