Swarm intelligence in plants

[IceCube]

Article: http://sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/67424/title/Rooting_for_swarm_intelligence_in_plants

They’re underfoot and underappreciated. But the roots of a plant may demonstrate the remarkable wisdom of crowds just as swarms of honeybees or humans can.

Three plant scientists now propose that roots growing this way and that in their dark and dangerous soil world may fit a definition for what’s called swarm intelligence. Each tip in a root system acquires information at least partly independently, says plant cell biologist František Baluška of the University of Bonn in Germany. If that information gets processed in interactions with other roots and the whole tangle then solves what might be considered a cognitive problem in a way that a lone root couldn’t, he says, then that would be swarm intelligence.

The decisions that emerge from groups of individuals have intrigued a wide range of researchers, for in some cases crowds show an eerie wisdom. Honeybees looking for a new home can collectively pick excellent nest sites even as individual scouts advocate for a variety of choices. And combining people’s estimates of how many marbles are in a jar or what an animal at a country fair would yield in pounds of butchered meat often come quite close to the correct answer.

Plant life may exhibit collective decision making too, Baluška and his colleagues propose in the December Trends in Ecology and Evolution. They urge researchers to look beyond the animal kingdom and into the behavior of plant roots for evidence of crowd wisdom. Information could pass among root tips via secreted chemicals, released gases or perhaps even electrical activity that connects “brainlike” command centers in root tips, the researchers propose. But however the information travels, the interactions could yield swarmlike decisions about where and how much to grow.

Intelligently swarming roots are plausible, responds Jens Krause of Humboldt University in Berlin, who earlier this year published a review of research on animal and human swarm intelligence. Now he says he wants to see research presenting a full case for particular examples in plants.

“Applying the notion of swarm intelligence to plants, and not just to animals,” Krause says, “is interesting in the sense that swarm intelligence might provide a drive for group living in organismal life in general.”

A plant can deploy a considerable number of roots — 13,815,672 for a barley plant according to a classic study Baluška cites. The best evidence for swarm intelligence, Baluška speculates, might be found in exploring how myriad roots grow to exploit nutrient bonanzas that they come across in the soil. Roots also must compete with the roots of other plants for food and water; news from these skirmishes apparently travels far from the front. In earlier experiments dividing a plant’s roots between two pots, the segment in a private pot still shows a response if its counterparts in another container meet some nutrient-sucking intruder. And cutting off part of a root system triggers a reaction elsewhere.

The mechanism behind this — how one root finds out what another is up to — may be the most controversial part of the smart-roots idea. In their recent commentary, Baluška and colleagues recognize a range of possibilities, but in other papers have explored the idea that news travels via nerve-like electrical signals. Hormonal signals seeping along millimeter-by-millimeter would be too slow, they reason. Contrary to the usual view of plants as living the slow life, they do need fast information transfer.

The idea that plants basically have nerves — a conclusion that grows out of hard-to-interpret observations of electrical activity in plant tissue — has ignited a thunderstorm of its own among plant scientists in recent years.

“The use of the word intelligence (with or without swarm) simply humanizes (or animalizes, since they talk about swarms) the situation,” says David Robinson or the University of Heidelberg in Germany. Such “silly” terminology, in his words, “reduces serious plant science to the level of esoterics.”

However, he’s not disputing the ability of plants to solve complicated strategic problems. “Of course,” he says, “it’s well known that roots have ‘cognitive’ abilities.”

 

[tripsis]

Fascinating read on a controversial topic.

The best evidence for swarm intelligence, Baluška speculates, might be found in exploring how myriad roots grow to exploit nutrient bonanzas that they come across in the soil.

Reminds me of how species in the family Ericaceae will form a root ball (I forget actual term) around something such as a dead insect in the soil to exploit the high levels of nutrients present, but will then die away after a few days once the nutrients have been consumed.

[ThunderIdeal]

do insects decompose that quickly? i wonder if those roots are not just after the dead bugs nitrogen.

"In earlier experiments dividing a plant’s roots between two pots, the segment in a private pot still shows a response if its counterparts in another container meet some nutrient-sucking intruder."

this really needs to be expanded upon, because the way it reads you could launch one tube into space and once separated by millions of kilometers of near vacuum you chop a root and the space-faring roots respond. how does that work, entangled particles? lol maybe that's how all of this fast communication between plant parts happens.

[ThunderIdeal]

just idle speculation here, but quantum entanglement could be responsible for many strange things like clairvoyance for instance, perhaps it serves to connect up parts of the universe. it's a bit off topic but there is this idea that we can probably never learn what is beyond 'the observable universe'. any wave that originates beyond the observable universe can never reach us due to the expansion of the universe and the speed of light. what if one particle from an ancient entangled pair is currently outside of the observable universe and the other one is somewhere handy?

[tripsis]

No, I doubt the insect would have decomposed by that stage, but the plant will have taken what it wants/needs.

In earlier experiments dividing a plant’s roots between two pots, the segment in a private pot still shows a response if its counterparts in another container meet some nutrient-sucking intruder."

this really needs to be expanded upon, because the way it reads you could launch one tube into space and once separated by millions of kilometers of near vacuum you chop a root and the space-faring roots respond. how does that work, entangled particles?

I think what it is saying is that the plant is leftwhole, but with half its root system in one pot and the other half in another. I can't see why the results are that amazing, the plant is still the one organism, just with it roots somewhat separated. Could be divided by a rock in the soil for all that it matters.

[Rabaelthazar]

Yeah, I agree. I don't think this is particularly amazing.

The fingers on our hands aren't separate entities, the tentacles on an octopus aren't separate entities, the roots of a plant aren't separate entities.

Surely someone who read a proposal of this research pointed that out to the scientists!?! ...or am I missing something?

[ThunderIdeal]

so every single specimen of any given cultivar is all the same plant? they all came from cuttings propagated on from one original specimen, or does it only count if it's a root division? what about a cultivar that came from a sport on a genetically different, seed grown plant? in my head the boundary between one organism and the other is very different in the plant world, plants are more like a mass of cooperating tissues, if there were any simple way to define one from another despite vegetative propagation it would have to be "everything coming from a single seed, except any of it's seed progeny, is a single plant".

it makes no scientific sense, not that i'm a hard science head, but the two plants need to communicate via some physical energy even if it is via the mysterious quantum entanglement!!! but more likely via a more well understood force, chemical or electromagnetic.

[ThunderIdeal]

and besides when i chop your hands off you won't be twiddling your fingers until a doctor re-attaches them.

[tripsis]

The point is, is that I don't think they are actually talking about root division resulting in two separate plants, but physically putting half of the roots from a single plant into one pot and the other half of the roots into another potand then seeing how they react to stimuli in each pot and what the roots in the adjacent pot do. Much like grabbing an octopus and put 4 of it tentacles into one tank,then the other 4 in another, etc, etc.

I am very doubtful that a genetically identical couple of plants (from cuttings, root division or whatever other means of asexual reproduction you can think of) in separate locations would have a means of communication that would allow one plant to react to the other finding nutrients, beyond chemicals cues through the air. If it were limited to chemical cues, then simply having enough distance between the two plants would mean that communication would not be possible.

[ThunderIdeal]

ooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh right right

maybe my poor interpretation will lead to our first peek beyond "the observable universe".

somebody make stephen hawking read this thread.

Edited December 14, 2010 by ThunderIdeal

[mutant]

Cool thread, tripsis. Maybe it relates with the ability of cactus seedlings to go particularly well when crowded.

ThunderIdeal

it makes no scientific sense, not that i'm a hard science head, but the two plants need to communicate via some physical energy even if it is via the mysterious quantum entanglement!!! but more likely via a more well understood force, chemical or electromagnetic.

You didn't seem to be so scientifical/sceptical AT ALL when it came to the subject : "Are visions/hallucinations due to big doses of classic psychedelics true encounters with spirits/other worlds or just a normal effect of the drugs?"

Edited December 14, 2010 by mutant

[tripsis]

Not my thread mutant, but I do agree it's a good one.

Hmmm, it's an interesting point that swarn intelligence may have something to crowded cacti seedlings doing well. The article doesn't go into communication between plants though, just between an individual's roots. While communication between plants has been research, such as when one plant is attacked by insects, it will send out chemical cues to other plants of the same species allowing them to activate defense mechanisms, but this article is a little different. Seeing as they are suggesting electrical signals such as those seen in the neural networks of animals are potentiallyat work in the roots of plants, if they were to suggest that the roots of different plants were connected by these same electrical signals, it would be dangerously close to what was portrayed in the Avatar movie.

[Yawning Man]

Hmm very interesting subject. I'm a fence sitter at this point but i think there might be something to this. But say a root tip has a number of chemicals to release for whatever purpose. So root 1 encounters a rock and cant penetrate any deeper. Release chemical A, which indicates lack of room. Is that basically what swarm intelligence is?

What about mycellium in the soil. Communication between two different lifeforms?

cheers

[tripsis]

In animals swarm intelligence is intelliegence between masses of individuals, but these researchers are trying to claim that one organism can have swarm intelligence too (in this case via the roots of a plant). If that were the case, then surely every single multicellular organism would be considered to have swarm intelligence as the cells of an organism communicate to each other to make the best decisions. Communication between cells in mycelium would fall into the same category, but I think it's different to individual animals in a group situation being able to make a collective decision.

[Rabaelthazar]

Now this is more along the lines of swarm intelligence, IMO (not plants, obviously)

 

 

Edited December 15, 2010 by Rabaelthazar

[tripsis]

I agree, it does resemble swarm intelligence as described in animals. However, slime moulds are made up of genetically identical cells, so could be considered the one organism. The fact that for most of their life cycle they live as independent single cells comlicates things. They are without a doubt fascinating.

If sea sponges are blended up, even when two separate species are blended together, the cells of each species will pull together again until they are once more assembled as a sponge.

[Rabaelthazar]

I agree, it does resemble swarm intelligence as described in animals. However, slime moulds are made up of genetically identical cells, so could be considered the one organism. The fact that for most of their life cycle they live as independent single cells comlicates things. They are without a doubt fascinating.

If sea sponges are blended up, even when two separate species are blended together, the cells of each species will pull together again until they are once more assembled as a sponge.

 

Very interesting. I like this thread.

[occidentalis]

slime molds - check this out:

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s189608.htm

[mescalito]

and so are we

Brian: You are all individuals! Crowd: YES, YES, WE ARE ALL INDIVIDUALS! Brian: You are all different! Crowd: YES, WE ARE ALL DIFFERENT! Lone Voice: I'm not. Person next to him: SHH!

[ThunderIdeal]

Cool thread, tripsis. Maybe it relates with the ability of cactus seedlings to go particularly well when crowded.

ThunderIdeal

You didn't seem to be so scientifical/sceptical AT ALL when it came to the subject : "Are visions/hallucinations due to big doses of classic psychedelics true encounters with spirits/other worlds or just a normal effect of the drugs?"

 

i was gonna take you off ignore next year

[mutant]

A tuned in guy like you shouldn't take philosophical forum discussions so personally. I apologise if I spoilt your mood.

[ThunderIdeal]

don't apologise. i just don't want to let that old battle re-ignite.

[mutant]

I like discussing in tension, only when something is worth discussing. The apology was for the off-topic and needless jab.

Also no need to approach the "r u a believer" debate as a battle.

Now swarm intelligence....

Reading the text again, I understand something like

the roots of a plant can map the soil area for the plants best evolution

which makes lots of sense IMO