Scientists suggest that buzzing can be used as an ecological way to improve pollination. Plants can “hear them” and produce more nectar when bees are around, scientists discovered.
A new investigation suggests that plants are more active “partners” than you thought about your symbiotic relationship mutualist with his pollinators and this behavior can be a survival strategy.
Francesca Barberoa zoologist at the University of Turin, who led the investigation, explains: “There is increasing evidence that both insects and plants can feel and produce, or transmit, vibroacoustic signs.”
BARBERO adds that this discovery further reinforces the “surprising variety” of ways in which plants can see the environment Around it, including the presence of beneficial and harmful insects, temperature, drought and wind, he added, quoted by.
The research team believes that in the future, the buzzing will be used in the flower fields as an ecological form of improve agricultural pollination.
Scientists are still unsure how plants do to “listen”, but the most accepted hypothesis is that they depend on mechanoreceptors, cells that respond to mechanical stimuli such as touch, pressure or vibration: “Plants have no brain, but they can feel the environment and answer accordingly. ”
After observing that bees and other insects have vibrational signs Distinct that are used in mating and other forms of communication, Barbero and his colleagues decided to investigate whether plants detected these signs.
Through recordings, scientists reproduced zombidos from caracol near dandelionComparing the plant response to bees, with the sound of a non -pollinating wasp and environmental sounds.
It was possible to observe that in response to the noise of the cracol bees, the dandelive mouths increased the volume of nectar and you sugar content and presented a change in genes that control sugar transport and nectar production.
“The ability to distinguish pollinators that approach based on their vibroacoustic signs can be a adaptive strategy of plants ”, explains Barbero, revealing that this can be evolutionary behavior in order to induce pollinators to spend more time in the flowers.
It was clear that the buzzing can trigger nectar production, now scientists will investigate whether plant sounds are actively used to attract adequate pollinators.
After exposing the plants to the sounds of his best pollinators, which increased the attraction of the particular species, Barbero indicates in what is now necessary, “confirm this, we need to perform tests to evaluate how different nectar concentrations attract different types of species.
The research results were presented on Wednesday at the 188th Joint Meeting of the American acoustic society and at the 25th International Acoustic Congress in New Orleães.
