Simultaneous and intercontinental tests show synchronism between the local gravimetric tide and the ultra-weak photon emission in seedlings of different plant species

Abstract

In order to corroborate the hypothesis that variations in the rate of spontaneous ultra-weak photon emission (UPE) from germinating seedlings are related to local variations of the lunisolar tidal force, a series of simultaneous tests was performed using the time courses of UPE collected from three plant species-corn, wheat and sunflower-and also from wheat samples whose grains were transported between continents, from Brazil to The Netherlands and vice versa. All tests which were run in parallel showed coincident inflections within the UPE time courses not only between seedlings of the same species but also between the different species. In most cases, the UPE inflections were synchronised with the turning points in the local gravimetric tidal variation. Statistical tests using the local Pearson correlation verified these coincidences in the two time series. The results therefore support the hypothesis of a relationship between UPE emissions and, in the oscillations, the local gravimetric tide. This applies to both the emissions from seedlings of different species and to the seedlings raised from transported grain samples of the same species.

Time-resolved ultra-weak photon emission as germination performance indicator in single seedlings

“…Long term variations in UPE measured from multiple seedlings have been noted previously in tests [17 , 18] . For single seedlings, one possible cause of UPE variation could be the different position or orientation of the growing seedling relative to the PMT active cathode.…”

“…Under acute stress, when a chemical stressor is applied after the first days of germination, the response is the opposite, with the more damaged, less developed sprouts presenting higher photon-counts, just after the stress, than the control samples, and the burst lasting for few hours (6–12 h) [16] . Our group also presented evidence that non-stressed samples presented daily and monthly oscillations behaving similar to the local gravimetric tide profile, with coincident pattern inflections and similar periodic components for different species [17 , 18] .…”

Peter Barlow’s insights and contributions to the study of tidal gravity variations and ultra-weak light emissions in plants

“…It was also shown that the UPE profiles for seedlings of different species measured in parallel, e.g. wheat-corn and corn-sunflower (Helianthus annuus), present turning points consistently coincident with those of the local gravity tide (Gallep et al, 2017).…”

“…A further contribution in this field appeared recently, in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Leiden, Netherlands (Gallep et al, 2017). UPEs were measured from wheat seedlings taken from a stock transported overseas from Brazil to the Netherlands (direct São Paulo to Amsterdam) and back, in July 2014, taken in parallel with those from local stocks.…”

The botanical multiverse of Peter Barlow

“…More recently, Peter's interests turned towards the moon and the influence that this satellite may have on biological phenomena on Earth [99]. That conference presentation was followed up by many papers investigating the influence of the moon on such plant phenomena as leaf movements [99][100][101], stem elongation [102], fluctuations in diameters of tree stems [103], root growth [104][105][106], emissions of biophotons by seedlings [107][108][109][110], and chlorophyll fluorescence [111]. Not constrained by gravity, Peter was also developing ideas about extraterrestrial influences and plant bioelectricity [112].…”