Night-Time Transpiration - Favouring Growth?

Plants grow and transpire water during the day and night. Recent work highlights the idea that night-time transpirational water loss is a consequence of allowing respiratory CO2 to escape at sufficiently high rates through stomata. Respiration fuels night-time leaf expansion and requires carbohydrates produced during the day. As carbohydrate availability and growth are under the control of the plants' internal clock, so is night-time transpiration. The cost of night-time transpiration is that water is lost without carbon being gained, the benefit is a higher efficiency of taken up water for use in leaf expansion. This could provide a stress acclimation process.