Auxin plant hormones govern many biological processes in higher plants such as cell divisions and enlargement, developmental differentiation, and the syntheses of specific proteins. Among this class of plant hormones we are specifically interested in compounds, the parent compound of which is 3-indole acetic acid (IAA). IAA and some of
its halogenated derivatives are naturally occuring auxins. In addition a large number of synthetic IAA conjugates and derivatives of different degrees of activity have been tested experimentally on various plant cultures.
In an effort to correlate biological activity with structure data, we have performed quantum chemical ab initio calculations of IAA and several derivatives.