Ep. 325 - Toxic Soils & Drinking Water From Rocks
In Defense of Plants Podcast
In Defense of Plants
4.8 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 11 July 2021
⏱️ 59 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Everyone needs a bit of calcium in their diet, but too much of it can cause serious health issues. The same is true for plants. Growing in soils high in calcium is no walk in the park and yet, around the world, we see many plants that have adapted to soils made toxic by calcium sulfate. How they manage to adapt to such conditions is the main research interest of Dr. Sara Palacio. She focuses her work on the evolution and physiology of plants that grow in soils dominated by gypsum. Her work has her looking at everything from how plants use calcium sulfate to their advantage and the effects of herbivory on gypsum endemics to how some plants are able to get water directly from rocks! Join us for a fascinating dive into the world of gypsum plants. This episode was produced in part by Lauren, Danielle, Allie, Jeffrey, Amanda, Tommy, Marcel, C Leigh, Karma, Shelby, Christopher, Alvin, Arek, Chellie, Dani, Paul, Dani, Tara, Elly, Colleen, Natalie, Nathan, Ario, Laura, Cari, Margaret, Mary, Connor, Nathan, Jan, Jerome, Brian, Azomonas, Ellie, University Greens, Joseph, Melody, Patricia, Matthew, Garrett, John, Ashley, Cathrine, Melvin, OrangeJulian, Porter, Jules, Griff, Joan, Megan, Marabeth, Les, Ali, Southside Plants, Keiko, Robert, Bryce, Wilma, Amanda, Helen, Mikey, Michelle, German, Joerg, Cathy, Tate, Steve, Kae, Carole, Mr. Keith Santner, Lynn, Aaron, Sara, Kenned, Brett, Jocelyn, Ethan, Sheryl, Runaway Goldfish, Ryan, Chris, Alana, Rachel, Joanna, Lori, Paul, Griff, Matthew, Bobby, Vaibhav, Steven, Joseph, Brandon, Liam, Hall, Jared, Brandon, Christina, Carly, Kazys, Stephen, Katherine, Mohsin Kazmi Takes Pictures, Manny, doeg, Daniel, Tim, Philip, Tim, Lisa, Brodie, Bendix, Irene, holly, Sara, and Margie.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | In Defensive Plants is made possible by all of our wonderful patrons that support the podcast each |
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| 0:30.5 | help spread the love of plants around the globe. Hello everyone and welcome to the |
| 0:35.0 | Indefensive Plants podcast, the official podcast of |
| 0:37.7 | Indefensiveplants.com. What's up? This is your host, Matt. Welcome to the show. How's everyone |
| 0:41.8 | doing this week? When the going gets tough, plants can't get up and move. After all, they are |
| 0:46.8 | rooted into position. This means that often plants have to adapt to extreme growing conditions |
| 0:52.1 | if they are to survive. My guest today studies what it takes for plants to adapt to conditions that other organisms simply |
| 0:59.0 | can't. |
| 0:59.9 | Specifically, we're talking about gypsum today, and joining us to talk about this is Dr. Sarah Palacio. |
| 1:05.7 | Dr. Palacio is very interested in sort of the morphological, anatomical, and physiological ways that plants |
| 1:12.3 | can adapt to living in soils that are really high in gypsum. |
| 1:16.4 | As you may remember from a previous podcast episode on gypsum soils, they are full of calcium |
| 1:21.5 | and sulfate, which means not every plant can do well there. |
| 1:24.6 | In fact, it can be very toxic to most plant species, but |
| 1:27.6 | some plants survive just fine. In fact, they thrive in these soils. This is a really cool |
| 1:33.1 | frontier when it comes to botanical science, and you're even going to learn how some plants |
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