Month: September 2022

RARE PLANT STRATEGY. "The use of prey by plants has been thought to usually not be the most economical way for plants to secure nutrients. This appears to be borne out by the relative rarity of the plant carnivorous syndrome, being present in only approximately 0.2% of flowering plant species." Some think this may be an under-estimate. https://lnkd.in/eGcB3qT View in LinkedIn

CURIOUS BEASTIES. "Carnivorous plants have fascinated scientists and the general public since the pioneering studies of Charles Darwin. No doubt part of their wide appeal is that carnivorous plants have turned the evolutionary tables on animals, consuming them as prey, with the green predators often equipped with remarkable lures, traps, stomachs, and—in a few cases—extraordinary speed of movement." https://lnkd.in/eAvpP47 View in LinkedIn

DUAL USE OF LEAVES. "It is not surprising that the dual use of leaves for photosynthesis and nutrient uptake has deeply reduced the net photosynthetic rate of terrestrial carnivorous plants, leading ultimately to reduction of the relative growth rate." https://lnkd.in/eyitYYX View in LinkedIn

SPEEDY MOTION. "Some active carnivorous plants have evolved traps that can move faster as theoretically possible due to pure hydraulics. A well-known example for this phenomenon is the snap-trap of the Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula, Droseraceae), which performs a combination of stimulus-triggered, active hydraulic motion followed by a passive release of elastic energy stored in the trap lobes." https://lnkd.in/eBHw6w4 View in LinkedIn

"ACTIVE TRAPS move while trapping. To synchronize their movements action potentials (APs) are generated." https://lnkd.in/ebkP3Jk View in LinkedIn

SLIPPERY SLOPE. "Plants in the genus Nepenthes obtain a substantial nutrient supply by trapping insects in highly modified leaves. A broad zone of the inner surface of these pitchers is densely covered with wax crystals on which most insects lose their footing. This slippery wax surface, capturing prey and preventing its escape from the trap, plays a pivotal role in the carnivorous syndrome." https://lnkd.in/e5qyHRe View in LinkedIn

SLIP MECHANICS. "Carnivorous plants of the genus Nepenthes have evolved a striking diversity of pitcher traps that rely on specialized slippery surfaces for prey capture. With a comparative study of trap morphology, we show that Nepenthes pitcher plants have evolved specific adaptations for the use of either one of two distinct trapping mechanisms: slippery wax crystals on the inner pitcher wall and ‘insect aquaplaning’ on the wet upper rim (peristome)." https://lnkd.in/eRvVEeB View in LinkedIn

MODULATED MECHANISMS. "Species without wax crystals had wider peristomes with a longer inward slope. Ancestral state reconstructions identified wax crystal layers and narrow, symmetrical peristomes as ancestral, indicating that wax crystals have been reduced or lost multiple times independently." https://lnkd.in/eRvVEeB View in LinkedIn

COUNTERING STICKY FEET. "Experimental data showed that none of the flies was able to walk across any of the waxy surfaces and only a few were able to take off from those surfaces. Both the absence of sites for claw anchorage, especially in N. ventrata, and the wax itself were shown to contribute to the trapping ability of the plants. We hypothesize that wax interacts with adhesive fluids secreted by the fly pad and thereby prevents the tenent setae from functioning effectively." https://lnkd.in/eBJsvKZ View in LinkedIn

UNIQUE PROTEINS IN PITCHER PLANTS. "The digestive fluid of Nepenthes rafflesiana is highly viscoelastic and that this physical property is crucial for the retention of insects in its traps. Trapping efficiency is shown to remain strong even when the fluid is highly diluted by water, as long as the elastic relaxation time of the fluid is higher than the typical time scale of insect movements." https://lnkd.in/eufMNnU View in LinkedIn