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  root tip glues
From: botanist at malesiana.com (Peter Boyce) on 2008.06.13 at 10:34:18(17837)

Dear All,

Today I took a look through the research collection and managed to find a nice flagellifrom shoot of Rhaphidophora megasperma with nicely photogenic root cap gel.

Enjoy!

Peter

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From: lbmkjm at yahoo.com (brian lee) on 2008.06.13 at 20:41:44(17840)
Dear Peter,

Aloha.

Excellent photo. Is this root glue cap persistent for long? It reminds me of Cycad mucilage...when dry this is a thin film...it has hydroscopic properties and when wet, the film expands into a mass of gel...like some of those water absorbing polymers.

Aloha,

Leland

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From: botanist at malesiana.com (Peter Boyce) on 2008.06.16 at 07:17:09(17845)
Dear Leland,

The gel cap 'moves' with the active tip and remains gellified for as long as
the root tip is active. Here in the everwet tropics the gel remains wet
throughout the activity of the root but I have seen in he monsoonal tropics
that the get cap of species such as Rhaphidophora megaphylla and Scindapsus
officinalis dries into a close-fitting sheath that does indeed appear to be
hygroscopic in that once the wet returns the get cap rehydrates.

Peter

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From: lbmkjm at yahoo.com (brian lee) on 2008.06.17 at 18:44:55(17865)
Dear Peter,

Aloha.

Fascinating. I always thought that the hygroscopic cycad gel would be useful to make some economic product due to the extreme degree of volume expansion from dry to wet. The concept would be useful for some bio-product development.

Thanks again for your observations of monsoonal versus ever-wet tropics gel cap activity...always interesting reading.

Aloha,

Leland

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