Endogenous electromagnetic fields in plant leaves: a new hypothesis for vascular pattern formation

Abstract

Electromagnetic (EM) phenomena have long been implicated in biological development, but few detailed, practical mechanisms have been put forth to connect electromagnetism with morphogenetic processes. This work describes a new hypothesis for plant leaf veination, whereby an endogenous electric field forming as a result of a coherent Frohlich process, and corresponding to an EM resonant mode of the developing leaf structure, is capable of instigating leaf vascularisation. In order to test the feasibility of this hypothesis, a three-dimensional, EM finite-element model (FEM) of a leaf primordium was constructed to determine if suitable resonant modes were physically possible for geometric and physical parameters similar to those of developing leaf tissue. Using the FEM model, resonant EM modes with patterns of relevance to developing leaf vein modalities were detected. On account of the existence of shared geometric signatures in a leaf's vascular pattern and the electric field component of EM resonant modes supported by a developing leaf structure, further theoretical and experimental investigations are warranted. Significantly, this hypothesis is not limited to leaf vascular patterning, but may be applicable to a variety of morphogenetic phenomena in a number of living systems.

Keywords::

• Frohlich condensation
• Coherence domain
• Leaf vascularization
• Biological pattern formation

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Prof Michael Sayer, Professor Emeritus of Physics at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, for many helpful discussions. Thanks to Dr. Jonathan Breeze of the Imperial College of London, for helpful discussions on electromagnetic finite element modelling of dielectric microwave resonators. Many thanks to Prof Igor Jerman of the Institute for Bioelectromagnetics and New Biology, Slovenia, for helpful comments and advice.

Declaration of interest The author reports no conflicts of interest. The author alone is responsible for the content and writing of the paper.