‘We previously had basically no access to this measurement’

Photo Credit: Yale School of the Environment

Researchers at the Yale School of the Environment have developed a laser-based method to study how plants adjust their internal functions according to changing environmental stimuli such as temperature and sunlight.

Plants have evolved the ability to open or close their microscopic pores, called stomata, in response to the pressure changes in the world around them over millions of years. 

They can open them to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and continue the process of photosynthesis when desirable, or close them to protect their precious internal water supplies, Yale explained. 

The study, which was published in the journal PNAS, revealed that by using lasers to measure these minuscule changes, researchers can expand the number of plant species tested and speed up the process. 

“Almost every single land plant is using this principle of internal pressure in order to grow, reproduce, and do everything a plant does, but we previously had basically no access to this measurement,” said Craig Brodersen, a professor of plant physiological ecology and the lead author of the study. 

“So, a lot of the fundamental theory about how plants work is based on an extremely limited set of measurements on just a couple of species.”

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It’s the first study involving the process in bryophytes (a lineage that includes mosses), the report explained. This will help scientists better understand the evolutionary trajectory in some of the Earth’s oldest plant species. 

It replaces the slow and fragile process of using glass tubes the size of a human hair to sample the plant cells with laser pulses that vaporize a cell’s liquid in order to measure minuscule bubbles that form. 

The size of those bubbles reveals information about how plants react to pressure changes in the environment. 

The data gleaned from this process helps researchers understand how plants efficiently manage their water use, which has implications for the agricultural sector.

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The frequency and intensity of droughts have surged by nearly 30% since 2000 due to rising global temperatures, the United Nations explained. This has threatened agricultural output, water security, and impacted 1.8 billion people across the globe. 

Other plant studies have already helped scientists develop drought- and heat-resistant crops to help deal with these environmental changes. Advancements in irrigation, especially through the use of solar power instead of dirty diesel generators to efficiently pump the necessary water to crops, are also part of the solution.

The research team will continue to refine methods of understanding the pressure response in plants with the help of funding from Yale Planetary Solutions and the National Science Foundation.

Data-driven research exploring how nature responds to climate shifts can help us adapt our agricultural practices in order to protect food supplies, biodiversity, and keep people fed, especially in the world’s poorest areas.

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