An Evolution Equation for Plant Growth

Abstract

In a recent paper [1], plant growth and branching were modeled using a rod-based theory featuring Euler’s elastica. This work extended the works of Goreily et al. [2] and Silk et al. [3] on this topic. Special features of the model developed in [1] included an evolution equation for the flexural rigidity EI and intrinsic curvature νo and the use of an intermediate (growth) configuration.