STUDENTS: Christian Williams, Cody Evans, Cossette Orehek
PROJECT ADVISOR: Dr. Megan Van Etten
ABSTRACT:
Although plants do not have central nervous systems, they are capable of reaction to environmental stimulus, communication and possibly even learning. A now well-cited study tested whether plants can learn by repeatedly exposing Mimosa pudica plants to a harmless stimulus (dropping them). Normally these plants would close their leaves in response to the stimulus, but the results suggested that plants learned over repeated exposure to ignore it. However, other researchers have questioned whether the methods of the previous experiment were appropriate, calling into doubt whether the plants actually learned, or had simply exhausted their resources (Biegler, 2018). To address this issue, we have designed an experiment that will correct the methodological issues with the original experiment, the first half of which we have completed. We were unable to replicate the original experiment’s results. Instead, we found that plants seemed to shutdown rather than learn to ignore the stimulus. These results suggest that the interpretation of the previous experiment may indeed need to be revised.
Looks like a neat study, and your poster is visually appealing although it would have been nice to have the graphs enlarged. Assuming that “derooted” means the plants were pulling out of the soil, wouldn’t that interfere with their ability to respond? My understanding is the response is a loss of water pressure, and if they are derooted they cannot take up water (as evidenced by the death of a good portion of the plants).