Physicists reveal nature’s mathematical formula for survival - http://www.rdmag.com/News...
May 14, 2012
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"The vascular system of a leaf provides its structure and delivers its nutrients. When you light up that vascular structure with some fluorescent dye and view it using time-lapse photography, details begin to emerge that reveal nature's mathematical formula for survival. (...) "If you begin looking at them in any degree of detail, you will see all of those beautiful arrangements of impinging angles and where the big veins meet the little veins and how well they are arranged," (...) It's a pattern that can neutralize the effect of a wound to the leaf, such as a hole in its main vein. Nutrients bypass the hole and the leaf remains completely intact.
"Something that looks pretty looks pretty for a really good reason. It has a well defined and elegant function. We can scan the leaves at extremely high resolution and reconstruct every single little piece of vein, who talks to who, who is connected to who and so forth," (...)
- Amira
"This research is a unique interdisciplinary partnership in which physics is used to address biological problems, and it is our belief that the mathematical and physical sciences will play a major role in biomedical research in this century," (...) Magnasco says this research is a jumping off point for understanding other systems that branch and rejoin, including everything from river systems to neural networks and even malignant tumors. "When a tumor becomes malignant it vascularizes, so understanding all of this is extremely important for understanding how these things work."
- Amira
Revealing Nature's Mathematical Formula for Survival (video) http://www.youtube.com/watch...
- Amira