Plant protein responds to radio waves by making seedlings grow faster

By Jo Marchant

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A dose of radio waves seems to inspire plant seedlings to grow a minute faster, a acquire that, if confirmed, could maybe also acquire functions from farming to medication.

Margaret Ahmad at Sorbonne University in Paris, France, and her colleagues uncovered thale cress seedlings (Arabidopsis thaliana) to aged pulses of radio frequency (RF) radiation at 7 megahertz, a frequency on the full former by beginner radio operators.

The team chanced on that this altered the hiss of a sort of gentle sensor within the vegetation called a cryptochrome. The expression of plenty of genes regulated by …