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My lab's 'perfect' tomato plant tried to climb out of its own pot
I was helping a friend in his university greenhouse in Ithaca, checking on a gene-edited tomato line meant for better shelf life. We came back after the weekend to find one plant had grown these thick, woody vines that pushed it right over the edge of its container, spilling soil everywhere. He just looked at it and said, 'Well, we fixed the rotting gene, but I guess we woke up something else.' Has anyone else had a simple edit cause a totally unexpected physical change like that?
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river_dixon6mo ago
That's wild (and a little scary). What if it keeps growing and just... walks away?
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phoenix_bailey6mo ago
Actually, the fungus can't just get up and walk. The main body is the mycelium, a huge network of threads underground. The mushroom part we see is just the fruit. It's like an apple on a tree, the tree itself stays put. So it's stuck in place, even if it gets bigger.
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logan_mitchell5mo ago
Okay but "a little scary" feels like a stretch. It's just a mushroom, not some monster from a movie. Even if the mycelium gets huge, it's still stuck in the dirt. What's the worst that could happen?
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oliver_campbell96mo ago
Right @river_dixon? That's the stuff of bad dreams... just picturing it getting up and leaving.
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