When attacked, plants use bugs to protect themselves and to retaliate. It turns out they can also defend themselves by using their roots to secrete acid that brings bacteria to the rescue.

This quashes the misperception that plants are at the mercy of passing pathogens and sheds new light on a sophisticated signaling system inside plants that rivals the nervous system in humans and animals.

Researcher Harsh Bais says, “Plants are a lot smarter than we give them credit for. People think that plants, rooted in the ground, are just sitting ducks when it comes to attack by harmful fungi or bacteria, but we’ve found that plants have ways of seeking external help.”

Farmers are learning this, and they often add a protective microbe to the soil to boost plant immunity.

Art credit: freeimages.co.uk

Plants can’t move and it sometimes seems like Dreamland listeners can’t either! What if you want to listen to the latest show, but you don’t have a computer at home. You may also want to listen on your commute to and from work. We have the solution: Subscribe today! Regular unknowncountry.com. listeners only have access to a month of shows, but subscribers can listen?and re-listen?for an entire year, as well as download shows to an MP3 disc so you can listen in your car and in other places away from your computer. You get all this for less than $4 per month. So what are you waiting for?

NOTE: This news story, previously published on our old site, will have any links removed.

Dreamland Video podcast
To watch the FREE video version on YouTube, click here.

Subscribers, to watch the subscriber version of the video, first log in then click on Dreamland Subscriber-Only Video Podcast link.