The NY Times paper edition had the most beautifully printed image on the front of its science section this past week, and I saw it staring across from me as I sat on the downtown 6, an article about a plant that recognizes its family - and also who isn't - and acts accordingly...
It is fascinating to watch as the Cuscuta pentagona 'sniffs' the air and seeks out the tomato seedling, a plant it has identified as a foe. In addition it attacks at the roots, grabbing up nutrients for itself. If it recognizes one of its own, however, it 'politely restrains itself'.
The NY Times article is here. What made for great reading is that the plant behavior is seen by scientists as intentional and very 'animal-like', and that they are having a hard time suspending their disbelief and grasping that some (although only 2 are known at this point) plants can behave in this manner. Plants are plants and animals are animals, so it has been believed, but now this research is suggesting a departure from that line of thinking.
Either way, it makes me more interested in how my plants grow and interact. Although I doubt I will see anything so deliberate, it makes me look twice as my passionflower grows up my euphorbia!
matt at apartment therapy dot com
all images via NY Times: Justin Runyon/De Moraes and Mescher Labs, Brian McClatchy/De Moraes and Mescher Labs, and Animals Animals/Earth Scenes
Copyright © 2008 Apartment Therapy
Very interesting.
view Kerith's profile
Fascinating, loved the video. Real glad Redwood Trees aren't doing that...yet. All kinds of bad jokes come to mind, like Al Pacino holding a squirt container of Weed-B-Gone saying "You sniffin' at me?"
The world is changing. The plants are pissed. Quick! Everyone! To the store. We must make offerings of Miracle Grow.
I always wondered why it seemed the plants were trying trip me on my way down a hill...they want my nutrients.
Seriously, it does make sense to me, that this would occur, that the plants would have ways of distinguishing things. Probably because I don't know enough about plants to know that it is supposedly not possible.
But then we humans kind of look at things from one perspective...ours. We can't survive in Mono Lake, but shrimp dig it:
http://www.monolake.org/naturalhistory/shrimp.htm
And new stuff is found all the time:
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/30jul_monolake.htm
Where it's not expected:
http://www.livescience.com/animals/070518_anemone_whale.html
These discoveries that occur all the time, in many ways, reminds us human beings that we don't know squat. Things in the past that we thought we knew for sure to be a fact, were not facts.
Optimistically, it's good to think that we do our best to keep an open mind. But even in this article you posted, it says "The mention of the possibility of plant neurobiology elicits such visceral responses that Dr. Brenner said he had at times worried that it could harm his career."
Why is it that fascinating discoveries that might rock the foundations of what we believe can ruin careers? Why is it that going against the flow can ruin lives? Ostracize a person from other colleagues or people in general?
Why is it that people prefer pretty lies that they are comfortable with, over ugly truths that might change their world?
This man can report his findings and what HE sees it as being. That gives everyone else a chance to examine the findings and try out experiments on their own. Then folks can look for flaws in the research or try out new things.
Could have been worse, with a tomato plant Ouija board planter and saying it was the spirits of the dead coming back to feed on the living. :::giggles:::
view TRUE BLUE's profile
"...it makes me look twice as my passionflower grows up my euphorbia!"
...if that is not the cutest, geekiest thing...ever!
view kdkaboom's profile