Plant's Ability to Identify, Block Invading Bacteria Examined

http://www.rikenresearch.riken.jp/images/figures/hi_3936.jpg

Key Ideas:

• How plants defend themselves from infections may help researchers understand how people and other animals could be better protected from such pathogens.
• Dr. Hisashi Koiwa worked with colleagues in Germany and Switzerland to examine the immunities of different mutations of the arabidopsis plant.
• They wanted to know how a plant defends itself and what it uses for protection.
• Koiwa said that many researchers are studying the “molecular road” that a pathogen takes on its way to infect another organism.
• Developing new plant varieties through using this pathway would be better than breeding plants that are resistant to diseases.

Reflection:

I chose this story because when I typed in “immune system in the news” into Google, I clicked on a link and there were stories about plants. I didn’t know that plants had an immune system, and I thought that only humans and animals had one. I was really surprised to find that out. Now that I know this, I think that plants are much more interesting because they are more relatable to me, as a human. I think that this study will help find immunities for certain diseases. It could contribute to the finding of cures, and it could prevent future diseases from spreading. Because these researchers are finding ways to make plants immune to sickness, they could easily find ways for humans to form immunities to sickness as well. I hope that someday scientists will have found ways to keep people from getting sick. This course helped me to understand this topic because we studied the immune system.

MLA: Science Daily. "Plant's Ability to Identify, Block Invading Bacteria Examined." Science Daily: News & Articles in Science, Health, Environment & Technology. 21 Mar. 2010. Web. .