Shade plants in the spotlight: New method measures how plants in shade receive light
"When you have a better understanding of how different colors of light affect photosynthesis and plant growth, you can help growers develop smart ways to supplement natural sunlight with colored light. The effect occurs in plants shaded by other plants," explains Utrecht University environmental scientist Hugo de Boer, who initiated the study.
This is because plants only capture some of the sunlight for photosynthesis, the process plants use to convert sunlight and CO2 into glucose. Some of the light also passes through their leaves, mostly in the form of green light. You can see that yourself when you look up into a woodland canopy: the leaves look a bit like green filters above you. The same effect occurs with light beyond the visible part of the red color spectrum, in the frequency range of 700 to 750 nm. We call that color "far-red."
"Plants that grow in the shadow of other plants therefore receive a larger proportion of green and far-red light than plants that grow in full sunlight. Our research shows that plants have a special way of using the far-red part of the color spectrum for photosynthesis."
Photosynthesis in the shade
"Until now, researchers have seldom considered the possibility that plants utilize far-red light for photosynthesis," says WUR Ph.D. candidate Tinko Jans.
That is because previous experiments with monochromatic light have shown that plants mainly use light from the visible wavelengths (400 to 700 nm) for photosynthesis, and that light with shorter or longer wavelengths contributes little to the process.
"But when you combine far-red light with a small amount of visible light, it does in fact contribute considerably to photosynthesis. So we've developed a new method for measuring and modeling how additional far-red light contributes to photosynthesis."
Shade avoidance response.
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