<h5>What is plant stress?</h5><p>Plants require adequate sunlight, water, nutrients, and a suitable temperature to grow properly. They also need to be protected from pests, diseases, and other competing plants. When one or more of these conditions is not satisfied, plants experience stress. This stress can negatively affect their growth and end up causing permanent damage or death.</p><p>Excessive heat, over-watering, cold or frost, drought, and touching/ shaking can induce stress in plants. The most noticeable examples of plant stress are yellowing or browning of leaves, wilting, stunted growth, inability to bear fruits, etc.</p><figure class="image"><img src="https://firebasestorage.googleapis.com/v0/b/newsahoot.appspot.com/o/plants-emit-sounds-when-stressed%2Fsunflower-wilting.jpg?alt=media&amp;token=11f8c5ce-28ff-442b-b7a2-8391d147c86e"><figcaption>A healthy and wilting sunflower.&nbsp;</figcaption></figure><h5>How do plants communicate their stress?</h5><p>Charles Darwin, a famous biologist of the 19th century, discovered that plants are highly active organisms. They can move their leaves and roots in specific ways to better understand their environment, respond to stressors, and communicate information to other plants and animals in easily understandable ways.</p><p>Plants communicate information through chemicals. When plants are under threat of being attacked by fungi, bacteria, insects, or animals, they release gases called VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds) into the air. On detecting this gas, the neighbouring plants immediately start producing toxins to protect themselves. Plants also release VOCs to attract bacteria and fungi beneficial for their growth.</p><h5>Are plants capable of emitting sounds?</h5><p>Yes, plants also communicate through sounds. However, plant sounds are audible to other plants and animals only, not humans. That is because humans can listen to sounds whose frequencies range from 20 to 20,000 Hertz (Hz), while plant signals tend to be higher than 20,000 Hz.</p><p>Recently, scientists have been able to successfully identify these high-frequency sounds with the help of machine-learning models. These models have gone one step further and used these sounds to know about the current condition of the plants, such as dehydration levels, injury, etc.</p><p>This finding will help us understand more about how plants interact with their environment. It shall also improve how we practise agriculture since we will be able to predict and quickly respond to any kind of plant stressors.</p><p>Have you ever taken care of plants at your home? If yes, share your favourite gardening activity in the comments below.</p>

Plants can communicate with other plants and animals in their environment through chemicals and sounds.

Plants Emit Sounds When Stressed

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Plants Emit Sounds When Stressed

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