True Facts: Plants That Explode

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IMPORTANT CORRECTIONS BELOW:

We must also additionally thank Dr. Joan Edwards at Williams College for her incredible research and videos. Many of the videos used in this episode were from the Edwards Lab!

At 2:40: The right image is from Edwards et al. 2019. The left is from Duckett et al. 2009.

At 2:51: Both SEM images are from Edwards et al. 2019.

01:50: The left image is from Whitaker, Webster and Edwards, 2007. The right image is from Edwards et al. 2019.

03:03 & 04:22: The videos of the sphagnum moss capsules exploding are all from Whitaker and Edwards, 2010.

00:31: The “pasties” are not spores. They’re gemmae.

1:37: These aren’t leaves. They are bracts.

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Credits:
Dr Joan Edwards, Williams College
Dr Justin F. Jorge
Dr Dwight L. Whitaker
The Patek Lab
Dr Philippe Marmottant, LIPhy CNRS Grenoble
Dr Tom Lindtner
Dr Callin Switzer
Dr Simon Poppinga
Dr Robert Deegan
Dr Shuto Ito
Dr Dennis Evangelista
John Innes Centre, Germplasm Resources team, led by Dr Noam Chayut. The GR is supported by UKRI-BBSRC
BYUI

Read more about the JIC Germplasm Resources Unit https://www.jic.ac.uk/research-impact/germplasm-resource-unit/

Browse and order from JIC Germplasm Resources’s public seed collections: https://www.seedstor.ac.uk/

Citations

Chapman & Gray. (2012), Complex interactions between the wind and ballistic seed dispersal in Impatiens glandulifera (Royle). https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2745.2012.01977.x

Cooper ES et al. Gyroscopic stabilization minimizes drag on Ruellia ciliatiflora seeds. J R Soc Interface. 2018 Mar;15(140):20170901. doi: 10.1098/rsif.2017.0901.

Deegan, R.D. Finessing the fracture energy barrier in ballistic seed dispersal. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2745.2012.01977.x

Duckett, J. Et al. (2009). Exploding a myth: The capsule dehiscence mechanism and the function of pseudostomata in Sphagnum. The New phytologist. 10.1111/j.1469-8137.2009.02905.x.

Edwards J, et al. The Role of Water in Fast Plant Movements. Integr Comp Biol. 2019 Dec 1;59(6):1525-1534. doi: 10.1093/icb/icz081.

Edwards, J. et al. A record-breaking pollen catapult. Nature 435, 164 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/435164a

Evangelista D,et al. The mechanics of explosive dispersal and self-burial in the seeds of the filaree, Erodium cicutarium (Geraniaceae). J Exp Biol. 2011 Feb 15;214(Pt 4):521-9. doi: 10.1242/jeb.050567.

Fiorello I, et al. A Biohybrid Self-Dispersing Miniature Machine Using Wild Oat Fruit Awns for Reforestation and Precision Agriculture. doi: 10.1002/adma.202313906.

Grönquist P, et al. Analysis of hygroscopic self-shaping wood at large scale for curved mass timber structures. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aax1311.

Huang LJ, Fu WL. A water drop-shaped slingshot in plants: geometry and mechanics in the explosive seed dispersal of Orixa japonica (Rutaceae). Ann Bot. 2021 May 7;127(6):765-774. doi: 10.1093/aob/mcab017.

Jorge JF, Patek SN. Elastic pinch biomechanisms can yield consistent launch speeds regardless of projectile mass. doi: 10.1098/rsif.2023.0234.

Li, S., et al. Seed ejection mechanism in an Oxalis species. Sci Rep 10, 8855 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-65885-2

Lindtner, T et al. Repetitive hygroscopic snapping movements in awns of wild oats. doi: 10.1016/j.actbio.2021.08.048.

Marmottant P, et al. The walk and jump of Equisetum spores. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2013.1465.

Poppinga S, et al. A seed flying like a bullet: ballistic seed dispersal in Chinese witch-hazel (Hamamelis mollis OLIV., Hamamelidaceae). doi: 10.1098/rsif.2019.0327.

Ribera J, et al. Putting a New Spin on the Flight of Jabillo Seeds. Integr Comp Biol. 2020 Oct 1;60(4):919-924. doi: 10.1093/icb/icaa117.

Sakamoto, J.et al. A Study on Optimality of Fiber Direction of Bursting Fruit with Spiral Motion. Journal of the mechanical behavior of biomedical materials, 2010. https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:40266613

Volkov, et al. Distributions of Silica and Biopolymer Structural Components in the Spore Elater of Equisetum arvense, an Ancient Silicifying Plant, Frontiers in Plant Science, Vol 10. 2019. DOI=10.3389/fpls.2019.00210

Whitaker DL, Edwards J. Sphagnum moss disperses spores with vortex rings. doi: 10.1126/science.1190179. PMID: 20651145.

WHITAKER, D.L. et al. (2007), The biomechanics of Cornus canadensis stamens are ideal for catapulting pollen vertically. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2435.2007.01249.x

Yao, Lining et al. (2022). Autonomous Self-Drilling Seed Carriers for Aerial Seeding with Superior Success Rates. 10.21203/rs.3.rs-1341317/v1.

Zhang, F. et al. Unperceivable motion mimicking hygroscopic geometric reshaping of pine cones. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-022-01391-2

Written by Ze Frank