11 Story Idea? Email Paul.Nolan@Farms.com Better Farming | October 2024 “I am getting very much amused by my tendrils – it is just the sort of niggling work which suits me,” he wrote a friend in 1863. Amused or not, Darwin couldn’t explain why some of his tendrils twisted. It’s a mystery that has also perplexed Meroz, a physicist by training. One 2017 study pointed her in the right direction. In it, scientists led by the University of Buenos Aires grew lines of sunflowers under cramped conditions. They discovered that the plants naturally and consistently arranged themselves into a zig-zag pattern, almost like the teeth of a zipper. The arrangement likely helps the plants maximize their access to sunlight as a group. Meroz wondered if plant wiggles could be the engine that drives such patterns in plant growth. “For climbing plants, it’s obvious that it’s about searching for supports to twine on," said Meroz, a professor of plant sciences and food security. "But for other plants, it’s not clear why it’s worth it.” Here comes the sun To find out, she and her colleagues grew five, one-week-old sunflowers in rows. Then, like Darwin before them, they mapped out how the plants moved over the course of a week. Next, Nguyen and Peleg developed a computer program to analyze the patterns behind the sunflower growth. The researchers could also use their computer simulations to see what would happen if the sunflowers moved more or less – in other words, if they wiggled haphazardly or in a slow and steady pattern. If the digital plants didn’t wiggle at all, the group discovered, they would all wind up all leaning away from each other in a straight line. If they wiggled too much, in contrast, they would grow in a random pattern. If they moved with just the right amount of randomness, however, the sunflowers formed that tell-tale zig-zag, which, in real life plants, provides a lot of access to sunlight. Nguyen explained that plants seem to circumnutate to find where the best light is coming from, then grow in that direction. “When you add a little bit of noise into the system, it allows the plant to explore its surroundings and settle into those configurations that allow each plant to find maximum light exposure,” she said. “That happens to lead to this nice zig-zag pattern that we see.” In future experiments, the researchers will test out how sunflowers grow in more complicated arrangements. Meroz, for her part, is glad to see plants get some credit for the movers and shakers they really are. “If we all lived at the same time scales as plants, you could walk down the street and see them moving,” she said. “Maybe we’d all have plants as pets.” BF Research GET IN TOUCH TO START SAVING efficiencyMB.ca/agriculture customsolutions@efficiencyMB.ca 1-844-944-8181 SAVE ENERGY & MONEY IN YOUR AGRICULTURAL OPERATIONS We offer programs and financial incentives to help you with energy efficiency upgrades. Scan the QR code for more details.
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