Why hot plants resort to fetal position.Why hot plants resort to fetal position fetal position n. A position of the body at rest in which the spine is curved, the head is bowed forward, and the arms and legs are drawn in toward the chest. Leave a plant too long in the blazing sun and you'll notice a typical botanical reaction: The leaves curl up. In grasses and other plants, leaf rolling is a common response to stress, but botanists have remained unsure how much protection it actually provides. At the University of Illinois University of Illinois may refer to:
Other researchers experimenting with the desert resurrection plant resurrection plant, name for several plants, usually of arid regions, that may apparently be brought back to life after they are dead. In reality they have hygroscopic qualities which cause them to curl up when dry and to unfold when moist. , Selaginella lepidophylla, report that the curling response significantly reduces damage to the plant's photosynthetic enzyme system. Jefferson G. Lebkuecher and William G. Eickmeier of Vanderbilt University Vanderbilt University, at Nashville, Tenn.; coeducational; chartered 1872 as Central Univ. of Methodist Episcopal Church, founded and renamed 1873, opened 1875 through a gift from Cornelius Vanderbilt. Until 1914 it operated under the auspices of the Methodist Church. in Nashville held plants' leaves flat with a device resembling a tennis racket, then exposed the plants to indoor lighting equivalent to full sunshine. Compared with unrestrained plants under the same lights, the test plants showed marked destruction of chlorophyll and decreased activity within the electron transport electron transport n. The successive passage of electrons from one cytochrome or flavoprotein to another by a series of oxidation-reduction reactions during the aerobic production of ATP, with the electrons originating from an oxidizable substrate and system that converts sunlight into energy for the plant. "Curling reduces high-irradiance damage that would otherwise occur during dessication," they conclude. |
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