February 2024
Japanese scientists have been able to film how plants warn each other of a potential danger. The warning was communicated in the form of VOCs, volatile organic compounds, substances that are sent out by plants and sensed by other plants.
Two containers were employed in the experiment, one containing a collection of green leafs plus caterpillars, and another containing healthy specimens of a weed from the mustard family.
The attacked leaves sent out VOCs that were sensed by the weed, which then produced a defense response. The team used a fluorescence microscope to monitor the signals the weed released, according to an article in NextShark magazine (where you can also watch a video clip showing the plant response).
The discovery is described as groundbreaking, although the phenomenon was first documented in the 1980s.
The group of scientists concludes that the results “suggest that GLVs [green leaf volatiles] in the atmosphere are rapidly taken up by the inner tissues via stomata, leading to [Ca2+]cytincreases and subsequent defense responses in Arabidopsis leaves”.
Anders Bolling
