W.There was heat Among the first plants for animal husbandry and it is now the most widespread crop in the world. Thus it seems likely that he has a lot left to learn about what thrives. Yet, some 12,000 years after the beginning of the relationship between humans and wheat, the wheat plant was caught doing something unexpected. When its leaves got a coating of desert dust it helped with the much needed amount of phosphorus.
Ner Werner Gross of Ben Gurion University in the Negev of Israel had plants (or, rather, plants) in question. As DG Gross told a meeting of the American Geophysical Union earlier this year, which took place online in early December, his study was conducted near his home village of Nev Shalom in the Judean Hills. On top of this, he always saw that the leaves of the plant were completely covered in dust that had been carried there by a sandstorm from the Sahara desert.
It occurred to him that this dust might not be the light-blocking nuisance he saw at first glance. It can, on the contrary, be beneficial due to growth-enhancing elements like phosphorus which it contains. Until then, botanists had assumed that phosphorus has a very low value in landing dust on plants, as it is enclosed in an insoluble mineral called up at tight. This makes it unavailable for exploitation. DG Gross, however, argued that plants that grew near the desert are a source of almost all naturally occurring dust in the atmosphere, a way to absorb it could be well developed.
He and two colleagues, Sudip Tiwari, Ben Gurion and Ranlat Arele of the Gilat Research Center, therefore began experimenting with a pair of species, wheat and chickpeas (the 17th most sown crop in the world), both originally from the middle. East. As a control, they also grew some corn, a plant from America that thrives in a much less dusty environment.
First, after establishing them as seedlings, they starved their lack of phosphorus until they showed signs of deficiency like yellow leaves. They then scattered desert dust on the leaves of half a sample of each species, while taking steps to prevent any of them from reaching the soil. After this, despite the dust-laden corn suffering from phosphorus deficiency, the wheat and chickpea plants sprouted and grew more than twice the size of their volatile lab-mates. What’s more, this species was clearly ready for the arrival of dust. As soon as the phosphorus deficiency announced itself, two things happened. Their leaves become hairy, and so it is better to catch dust. And those leaves also begin to secrete acid fluids that can dissolve any infatite, aiding the absorption of phosphorus.
The plant can carry phosphorus through its leaves, which is not news for farmers, as this was established in 1950. But so far the practical result of such knowledge has been that the crop is sprayed with liquid manure, in turn, with rocks containing patite, which are treated with acid. DGsing leaves, DG gross suggests, may be an alternative and more effective way to provide the species of crops made from the desert with the phosphorus they need. And maybe not just that. His next plan is to see avocado and cocoa trees, which thrive in the tropical regions of the Americas, receiving a helpful transatlantic dose of Saharan dust to the west by regular trade winds. It will be interesting to see if he adopts the same tricks as wheat and chickpeas.■
This article appeared in the Science and Technology section of the print edition under the title “Good Catch”.
