Plants emit sounds in the ultrasonic range when stressed

REFERENCE:

Itzhak Khait, Ohad Lewin-Epstein, Raz Sharon, Kfir Saban, Revital Goldstein, Yehuda Anikster, Yarden Zeron, Chen Agassy, Shaked Nizan, Gayl Sharabi, Ran Perelman, Arjan Boonman, Nir Sade, Yossi Yovel, Lilach Hadany (2023 Mar 30). Sounds emitted by plants under stress are airborne and informative. Cell, 186(7):1328-1336.e10. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2023.03.009, PMID: 37001499. ARTICLE | FREE FULLTEXT PDF

By Neuronicus, 5 December 2023

The FIRSTS: Streptomycin was isolated and tested for its antibiotic properties by graduate students in 1943

A principal investigator tells a graduate student to discover new antibiotics using well known methods. Student discovers new antibiotic. Then, another graduate student performs the antibiotic tests to see if it works. Who takes the credit? The PI got the credit and the Nobel and the money. The discoverer sued and got some credit and some money. The tester got nothing. The tester was a woman. According to the woman’s daughter, “her mother’s colleagues told her it wasn’t important that her name be on the patent because she would one day get married and have a family”.

After the streptomycin controversy, the universities put forth regulations to make (somewhat) clearer who gets what in the process of discovery. Thanks to this and thanks to the women’s liberation movement and, more recently, the women’s fight for equality in workplaces, if this would happen today in a serious University, probably all three would share the Nobel. Probably.

Bibliography:

1)  Angelova, Lidiya. “Elizabeth Bugie – the invisible woman in the discovery of streptomycin”. Scientista | Women in STEM. Retrieved 2023-10-19.

2)  Eveleigh, Douglas E.; Bennett, Joan W. (2018-05-01), Whitaker; Barton (eds.), “Women Microbiologists at Rutgers in the Early Golden Age of Antibiotics”, Women in Microbiology, American Society of Microbiology, pp. 317–329, doi:10.1128/9781555819545.ch34, ISBN 978-1-55581-953-8

3)  Kingston W (July 2004). “Streptomycin, Schatz v. Waksman, and the balance of credit for discovery”. Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences. 59 (3): 441–462. doi: 10.1093/jhmas/jrh091. PMID 15270337. S2CID 27465970.

4) Schatz, Albert (1993). “The true story of the development of streptomycin”. Actinomycetes. 4 (2): 27–39. Couldn’t find the full text.

By Neuronicus, 19 October 2023