ROBERT: And I wanted to talk to them because, as building inspectors they -- there's something they see over and over and over. Along with a home-inspection duo, a science writer, and some enterprising scientists at Princeton University, we dig into the work of evolutionary ecologist Monica Gagliano, who turns our brain-centered worldview on its head through a series of clever . ANNIE MCEWEN: What was your reaction when you saw this happen? JENNIFER FRAZER: It's definitely crazy. And I remember it was Sunday, because I started screaming in my lab. They're not experiencing extra changes, for example. So what they're saying is even if she's totally sealed the pipe so there's no leak at all, the difference in temperature will create some condensation on the outside. Every time. And she says this time they relaxed almost immediately. But maybe it makes her sort of more open-minded than -- than someone who's just looking at a notebook. And I do that in my brain. And look, and beyond that there are forests, there are trees that the scientists have found where up to 75 percent of the nitrogen in the tree turns out to be fish food. But it didn't happen. LARRY UBELL: Or it's just the vibration of the pipe that's making it go toward it. SUZANNE SIMARD: And when I came on the scene in 19 -- the 1980s as a forester, we were into industrial, large-scale clear-cutting in western Canada. That is actually a clue in what turns out to be a deep, deep mystery. You got somewhere to go? I'm 84. You have a forest, you have mushrooms. The tree will wrap its roots around that pipe. Never mind.". You got somewhere to go? On the fifth day, they take a look and discover most of the roots, a majority of the roots were heading toward the sound of water. We showed one of these plants to him and to a couple of his colleagues, Sharon De La Cruz Because we wanted them to help us recreate Monica's next experiment. But it was originally done with -- with a dog. And I do that in my brain. MONICA GAGLIANO: Would the plant do the same? JAD: So we're up to experiment two now, are we not? I'll put it down in my fungi. ROBERT: She took some plants, put them in a pot that restricted the roots so they could only go in one of just two directions, toward the water pipe or away from the water pipe. Like, the tree was, like, already doing that stuff by itself, but it's the fungus that's doing that stuff? LINCOLN TAIZ: It's a very interesting experiment, and I really want to see whether it's correct or not. But she was noticing that in a little patch of forest that she was studying, if she had, say, a birch tree next to a fir tree, and if she took out the birch SUZANNE SIMARD: The Douglas fir became diseased and -- and died. One of the spookiest examples of this Suzanne mentioned, is an experiment that she and her team did where they discovered that if a forest is warming up, which is happening all over the world, temperatures are rising, you have trees in this forest that are hurting. ROBERT: Truth is, I think on this point she's got a -- she's right. [laughs]. And so I don't have a problem with that. Into which she put these sensitive plants. Thud. Oh, so it says to the newer, the healthier trees, "Here's my food. ROBERT: And it's in that little space between them that they make the exchange. I've been looking around lately, and I know that intelligence is not unique to humans. Take it. And we can move it up, and we can drop it. You give me -- like, I want wind, birds, chipmunks Like, I'm not, like, your sound puppet here. And with these two stimuli, she put the plants, the little pea plants through a kind of training regime. So after much trial and error with click and hums and buzzes She found that the one stimulus that would be perfect was A little fan. On one side, instead of the pipe with water, she attaches an MP3 player with a little speaker playing a recording of And then on the other side, Monica has another MP3 player with a speaker. LARRY UBELL: We are the principals of Accurate Building Inspectors of Brooklyn, New York. Oh, yeah. Well, let us say you have a yard in front of your house. Did Jigs emerge? That is correct. Let us say you have a yard in front of your house. Here's the water.". It's like a bank? Yeah. ], Test the outer edges of what you think you know. That's amazing and fantastic. No, I guess that I feel kind of good to say this. Back and forth. I go out and I thought there's no one here on Sunday afternoon. Me first. So just give me some birds. And his idea was to see if he could condition these dogs to associate that food would be coming from the sound of a bell. Different kind of signal traveling through the soil? And again. JAD: If a plant doesn't have a brain what is choosing where to go? Again, science writer Jennifer Frazer. Yes, we are related. And the -- I'm gonna mix metaphors here, the webs it weaves. ], [ROY HALLING: Jamie York is our Senior Producer. ROBERT: What do mean, the fungi will give me my sugar back? Let him talk. Crossposted by 4 years ago. But We did catch up with her a few weeks later. Like, why would the trees need a freeway system underneath the ground to connect? Now, you might think that the plant sends out roots in every direction. But she had a kind of, maybe call it a Jigs-ian recollection. But it didn't happen. But what I do know is that the fact that the plant doesn't have a brain doesn't -- doesn't a priori says that the plants can't do something. No boink anymore. But what -- how would a plant hear something? Fan, light, lean. Just a boring set of twigs. ROBERT: Eventually, she came back after ROBERT: And they still remembered. These guys are actually doing it." ROBERT: And then she waited a few more days and came back. And she goes into that darkened room with all the pea plants. And the pea plant leans toward them. In 1997, a couple of scientists wrote a paper which describes how fungi Jennifer says that what the tubes do is they worm their way back and forth through the soil until they bump into some pebbles. No, I guess that I feel kind of good to say this. This is Ashley Harding from St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada. And again. That is definitely cool. And so why is that? It's as if the individual trees were somehow thinking ahead to the needs of the whole forest. That's the place where I remember things. So he brought them some meat. JAD: Yeah, absolutely. And we can move it up, and we can drop it. I'm sorry? It's now the Wood Wide Web? Ring, meat, eat. Eventually over a period of time, it'll crack the pipe like a nutcracker. JENNIFER FRAZER: These little soil particles. So I don't have an issue with that. ROBERT: There's -- on the science side, there's a real suspicion of anything that's anthropomorphizing a plant. Playing via SpotifyPlaying via YouTube Playback options Listening on Switch Spotify device Open in Spotify Web Player ROBERT: I wanted to talk to them because, as building inspectors they -- there's something they see over and over and over. So they didn't. Truth is, I think on this point she's got a -- she's right. I don't know if you're a bank or if you're an -- so it's not necessarily saying, "Give it to the new guy." JAD: Wait a second. OUR PODCASTSSUPPORT US Smarty Plants LISTEN Download February 13, 2018 ( Robert Krulwich JAD: That apparently -- jury's still out. They run out of energy. But white, translucent and hairy, sort of. Of Accurate Building Inspectors. Wait a second. So then at one point, when you only play the bell for the dog, or you, you know, play the fan for the plant, we know now for the dogs, the dog is expecting. ROBERT: And when you measure them, like one study we saw found up to seven miles of this little threading JAD: What is this thing? I don't know if that was the case for your plants. She says the tree can only suck up what it needs through these -- mostly through the teeny tips of its roots, and that's not enough bandwidth. The problem is is with plants. And then I would cover them in plastic bags. SUZANNE SIMARD: It's just this incredible communications network that, you know, people had no idea about in the past, because we couldn't -- didn't know how to look. And so why is that? They learned something. ROBERT: That would be sugar-minerals-sugar-minerals-sugar-minerals-sugar-minerals-sugar-minerals-sugar-minerals-sugar-minerals-sugar-minerals. So it wasn't touching the dirt at all. The little threads just wrapping themselves around the tree roots. Well, it depends on who you ask. And you don't see it anywhere. I can scream my head off if I want to. Thanks to Jennifer Frazer who helped us make sense of all this. They designed from scratch a towering parachute drop in blue translucent Lego pieces. SUZANNE SIMARD: So we know that Douglas fir will take -- a dying Douglas fir will send carbon to a neighboring Ponderosa pine. ROBERT: It's kind of -- it's shaped like MONICA GAGLIANO: Like the letter Y, but upside down. Radiolab is supported in part by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, enhancing public understanding of science and technology in the modern world. And so on. And I'm wondering whether Monica is gonna run into, as she tries to make plants more animal-like, whether she's just gonna run into this malice from the scientific -- I'm just wondering, do you share any of that? LARRY UBELL: That -- that would be an interesting ALVIN UBELL: Don't interrupt. I mean, I see the dirt. JAD: It's like every time I close my eyes, you're coming at it from a different direction. ROBERT: I do want to go back, though, to -- for something like learning, like, I don't understand -- learning, as far as I understand it, is something that involves memory and storage. ROBERT: Five, four, three, two, one, drop! He's got lots of questions about her research methods, but really his major complaint is -- is her language. I'll put it down in my fungi. So otherwise they can't photosynthesize. So you can get -- anybody can get one of these plants, and we did. And the tree happens to be a weeping willow. He uses it to train his border www.npr.org Before you begin to think that this is weird science, stop. It's like a savings account? Testing one, two. MONICA GAGLIANO: And it's good it was Sunday. If a nosy deer happens to bump into it, the mimosa plant Curls all its leaves up against its stem. It involves a completely separate organism I haven't mentioned yet. I was, like, floored. Well, so what's the end of the story? And every day that goes by, I have less of an issue from the day before. We're just learning about them now, and they're so interesting. MONICA GAGLIANO: Picasso! Fan, light, lean. 46 7. Finally, one time he did not bring the meat, but he rang the bell. Robert Krulwich. There's -- on the science side, there's a real suspicion of anything that's anthropomorphizing a plant. I mean again, it's a tree. MONICA GAGLIANO: Like for example, my plants were all in environment-controlled rooms, which is not a minor detail. JENNIFER FRAZER: So what do we have in our ears that we use to hear sound? I remember going in at the uni on a Sunday afternoon. And after not a whole lot of drops the plant, she noticed, stopped closing its leaves. They remembered what had happened three days before, that dropping didn't hurt, that they didn't have to fold up. Once you understand that the trees are all connected to each other, they're all signaling each other, sending food and resources to each other, it has the feel, the flavor, of something very similar. JENNIFER FRAZER: The fungi needs sugar to build their bodies, the same way that we use our food to build our bodies. They're father and son. 2018. MONICA GAGLIANO: It's a very biased view that humans have in particular towards others. Wait a second. ROBERT: Huh. ROBERT: A tree needs something else. So maybe the root hairs, which are always found right at the growing tips of plant roots, maybe plant roots are like little ears. And when you measure them, like one study we saw found up to seven miles of this little threading What is this thing? JAD: The plants -- the plants stopped -- what is it they did? They're called feeder roots. They can go north, south, east, west, whatever. Or even learn? ROBERT: And right in the middle of the yard is a tree. ROBERT: Like, would they figure it out faster this time? JENNIFER FRAZER: And his idea was to see if he could condition these dogs to associate that food would be coming from the sound of a bell. Then she takes the little light and the little fan and moves them to the other side of the plant. It's almost as if these plants -- it's almost as if they know where our pipes are. And therefore she might, in the end, see something that no one else would see. ROBERT: You don't know what your dog was? The water is still in there. They shade each other out. PETER LANDGREN: Look at that. LINCOLN TAIZ: It's a very interesting experiment, and I really want to see whether it's correct or not. No. ROBERT: So after much trial and error with click and hums and buzzes MONICA GAGLIANO: All sorts of randomness. ROBERT: After three days of this training regime, it is now time to test the plants with just the fan, no light. So there's these little insects that lives in the soil, these just adorable little creatures called springtails. Monica's work has actually gotten quite a bit of attention from other plant biologists. ROBERT: One of the spookiest examples of this Suzanne mentioned, is an experiment that she and her team did where they discovered that if a forest is warming up, which is happening all over the world, temperatures are rising, you have trees in this forest that are hurting. So we've done experiments, and other people in different labs around the world, they've been able to figure out that if a tree's injured ROBERT: It'll cry out in a kind of chemical way. ], [ALVIN UBELL: Our fact-checker is Michelle Harris. You have to understand that the cold water pipe causes even a small amount of water to condense on the pipe itself. And she says this time they relaxed almost immediately. So there seemed to be, under the ground, this fungal freeway system connecting one tree to the next to the next to the next. ROBERT: So she takes the plants, she puts them into the parachute drop, she drops them. [laughs]. Well, some of them can first of all, and big deal. ROBERT: And she goes into that darkened room with all the pea plants. The bell, the meat and the salivation. ROBERT: Connecting your house to the main city water line that's in the middle of the street. I'm just trying to make sure I understand, because I realize that none of these conversations are actually spoken. Couldn't it just be an entirely different interpretation here? ROBERT: So it's not that it couldn't fold up, it's just that during the dropping, it learned that it didn't need to. And therefore she might, in the end, see something that no one else would see. And moved around, but always matched in the same way together. Special thanks to Dr. Teresa Ryan of the University of British Columbia, Faculty of Forestry, to our intern Stephanie Tam, to Roy Halling and the Bronx Botanical Garden, and to Stephenson Swanson there. Not really. And all of a sudden, one of them says, "Oh, oh, oh, oh! ], [JENNIFER FRAZER: Our staff includes Simon Adler, Brenna Farrow, David Gebel. Again, if you imagine that the pot, my experimental pot. And I wanted to talk to them because, as building inspectors they -- there's something they see over and over and over. All in all, turns out one tree was connected to 47 other trees all around it. Maybe there's some kind of signal? LARRY UBELL: That -- that's -- that's interesting. And it's good it was Sunday. Connecting your house to the main city water line that's in the middle of the street. ROBERT: And you can actually see this happen. I'm 84. As soon as we labeled them, we used the Geiger counter to -- and ran it up and down the trees, and we could tell that they were hot, they were boo boo boo boo boo, right? So there is some water outside of the pipe. Along with a home-inspection duo, a science writer, and some enterprising scientists at Princeton University, wedig into the work of evolutionaryecologist Monica Gagliano, who turns ourbrain-centered worldview on its head through a series of clever experiments that show plants doing things we never would've imagined. I mean, it's -- like, when a plant bends toward sunlight. Plants are complex and ancient organisms. I'm a research associate professor at the University of Sydney. I don't know. So she's saying they remembered for almost a month? So otherwise they can't photosynthesize. What was your reaction when you saw this happen? And so I was really excited. Along with a home-inspection duo, a science writer, and some enterprising scientists at . ], [JENNIFER FRAZER: And I am a science writer. ROBERT: She found that the one stimulus that would be perfect was MONICA GAGLIANO: A little fan. Or even learn? /locations/california/culver-city/5399-sepulveda-blvd-bank-atm/ ROBERT: Okay. And this is what makes it even more gruesome. Where would the -- a little plant even store a memory? The glass is not broken. It's a very interesting experiment, and I really want to see whether it's correct or not. I mean, it's a kind of romanticism, I think. No, so for example, lignin is important for making a tree stand up straight. So now, they had the radioactive particles inside their trunks and their branches. In my brain. MONICA GAGLIANO: Again, if you imagine that the pot, my experimental pot. MONICA GAGLIANO: I wonder if that was maybe a bit too much. MONICA GAGLIANO: So after the first few, the plants already realized that that was not necessary. ALVIN UBELL: If you look at a root under a microscope, what you see is all these thousands of feelers like hairs on your head looking for water. Well of course, there could be a whole -- any number of reasons why, you know, one tree's affected by another. Picture one of those parachute drops that they have at the -- at state fairs or amusement parks where you're hoisted up to the top. So you think that that this -- you think this is a hubris corrector? I was like, "Oh, my God! So I don't have a problem. JAD: What -- I forgot to ask you something important. That apparently -- jury's still out. And her family included a dog named Jigs. And I've been in the construction industry ever since I'm about 16 years old. Anyone who's ever had a plant in a window knows that. ROBERT: But that day with the roots is the day that she began thinking about the forest that exists underneath the forest. ROBERT: So that voice belongs to Aatish Bhatia, who is with Princeton University's Council on Science and Technology. Like trees of different species are supposed to fight each other for sunshine, right? My name is Monica Gagliano. The water is still in there. ], [JENNIFER FRAZER: Soren Wheeler is Senior Editor. So they didn't. They curve, sometimes they branch. One tree goes "Uh-oh." JENNIFER FRAZER: Then he would bring them the meat and he would ring a bell. Maybe there's some kind of signal? It's okay, puppy. Start of message. It's an integral part of DNA. What happened to you didn't happen to us. And all of a sudden, one of them says, "Oh, oh, oh, oh! That is cool. ROBERT: So let's go to the first. They still remembered. Sorry! The show is known for innovative sound design, smashing information int ROBERT: Actually, Monica's dog leads perfectly into her third experiment, which again will be with a plant. And she says this time they relaxed almost immediately. JAD: Are you bringing the plant parade again? ROBERT: And Monica wondered in the plant's case MONICA GAGLIANO: If there was only the fan, would the plant ROBERT: Anticipate the light and lean toward it? When they did this, they saw that a lot of the springtails that had the tubes inside them were still alive. I gotta say, doing this story, this is the part that knocked me silly. So this Wood Wide Web, is this just, like, the roots? They sort of put them all together in a dish, and then they walked away. But also SUZANNE SIMARD: The other important thing we figured out is that, as those trees are injured and dying, they'll dump their carbon into their neighbors. ALVIN UBELL: The tree will wrap its roots around that pipe. ROBERT: And then later, scientists finally looked at these things under much more powerful microscopes, and realized the threads weren't threads, really. ROBERT: Okay. That's a parade I'll show up for. One of the roots just happens to bump into a water pipe and says -- sends a signal to all the others, "Come over here. And lignin is full of nitrogen, but also compounds like nitrogen is important in DNA, right? ROBERT: Monica's work has actually gotten quite a bit of attention from other plant biologists. Let him talk. And then when times are hard, that fungi will give me my sugar back and I can start growing again. On one side, instead of the pipe with water, she attaches an MP3 player with a little speaker playing a recording of And then on the other side, Monica has another MP3 player with a speaker. As abundant as what was going on above ground. Or even learn? We need to take a break first, but when we come back, the parade that I want you to join will come and swoop you up and carry you along in a flow of enthusiasm. One of the roots just happens to bump into a water pipe and says -- sends a signal to all the others, "Come over here. Landing very comfortably onto a padded base made of foam. Just for example. ", ROBERT: So the deer's like, "Oh, well. The thing I don't get is in animals, the hairs in our ear are sending the signals to a brain and that is what chooses what to do. For this part of our broadcast, I'd like to begin by imagining a tall, dark, dense, green forest. SUZANNE SIMARD: Jigs had provided this incredible window for me, you know, in this digging escapade to see how many different colors they were, how many different shapes there were, that they were so intertwined. Like the bell for the dog. Smarty Plants by Radiolab | Podchaser Episode from the podcast Radiolab Next Episode Smarty Plants Released Wednesday, 14th February 2018 3 people rated this episode About Insights Pro Reviews Creators 9 Lists 1 Do you really need a brain to sense the world around you? And I need a bird, a lot of birds, actually. Like, can a tree stand up straight without minerals? Me first. I'm gonna just go there. The fungus is hunting. But then, scientists did an experiment where they gave some springtails some fungus to eat. Jad and Robert, theyare split on this one. SUZANNE SIMARD: Yeah. Transcript. She actually trained this story in a rather elaborate experimental setup to move away from the light and toward a light breeze against all of its instincts. AATISH BHATIA: All right. ALVIN UBELL: And the tree happens to be a weeping willow. Like so -- and I think that, you know, the whole forest then, there's an intelligence there that's beyond just the species. It spits out the O2. Five, four, three, two, one, drop! I think there are some cases where romanticizing something could possibly lead you to some interesting results. Could a plant learn to associate something totally random like a bell with something it wanted, like food? When they did this, they saw that a lot of the springtails that had the tubes inside them were still alive. Each one an ounce, an ounce, an ounce, an ounce, an ounce. And so the whole family and uncles and aunts and cousins, we all rush up there. And right in the middle of the yard is a tree. Annie McWen or McEwen ], [JENNIFER FRAZER: Latif Nasser, Malissa O'Donnell, Arianne Wack ], [ALVIN UBELL: Pat Walter and Molly Webber. JENNIFER FRAZER: This all has a history, of course. And if you go to too many rock concerts, you can break these hairs and that leads to permanent hearing loss, which is bad. But it didn't happen. LARRY UBELL: All right, my hypothesis is that what happens is LARRY UBELL: Can I -- can I have a few minutes? JENNIFER FRAZER: One of the things they eat is fungus. JAD: Where would the -- a little plant even store a memory? Each one an ounce, an ounce, an ounce, an ounce, an ounce. But we are in the home inspection business. Well, people have been measuring this in different forests and ecosystems around the world, and the estimate is anywhere from 20 to 80 percent will go into the ground. So light is -- if you shine light on a plant you're, like, feeding it? Into the roots, and then into the microbial community, which includes the mushroom team, yeah. The little threads just wrapping themselves around the tree roots. JENNIFER FRAZER: And this is what makes it even more gruesome. Well, okay. Image credits: Photo Credit: Flickred! Enough of that! ROBERT: And I met a plant biologist who's gonna lead that parade. But it was originally done with -- with a dog. MONICA GAGLIANO: My reaction was like, "Oh ****!" Wait. ], With help from Alexandra Leigh Young, Jackson Roach and Charu Sinha. So Monica moves the fans to a new place one more time. On the outside of the pipe. And not too far away from this tree, underground, there is a water pipe. And moved around, but always matched in the same way together. She thinks that they somehow remembered all those drops and it never hurt, so they didn't fold up any more. I mean, you're out there in the forest and you see all these trees, and you think they're individuals just like animals, right?
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