DO plants think? What sort of awareness do they have? Do they have memory? These may seem like questions from a high school philosophy course but for scientists working on a SARDI pilot epigenetic project, they have merit.
The interest lies not in a plant's 'awareness' of its surroundings, but the lessons it passes on to progeny after surviving drought conditions and poor soil quality.
A project funded by the South Australian Grains Industry Trust seeks to trace generational differences, after preliminary studies found wheat seeds derived from areas affected by drought gave stronger yields than those from good conditions, when replanted in similar conditions.
Led by principal crop physiologist Victor Sadras, the project has its roots in a preliminary study undertaken by Leader of New Variety Agronomy Program Rob Wheeler about seven years ago, and has been rekindled by recent developments in molecular biology.
Mr Wheeler was interested in how seeds of different varieties would perform if they were sourced from different locations and grown in the one location.
"We were going through the national variety trial system at the time with Yitpi, Krichauff, Wyalkatchem and Frame," he said.
"We took seeds harvested at each of the 25 locations around SA and grew it at the Turretfield Research Centre.
"Just to iron out any differences, we sieved all that seed to make sure it was all the same size so we were comparing apples with apples, with the only difference being where it was sourced."
Results showed varying results, with seeds grown from Ceduna performing quite differently from those derived from Sherwood in the South East.
The reasons for these differences remain unknown.
The latest project is in its second year of field work trials at Pinnaroo, Minnipa and Turretfield, growing four varieties - Wyalkatchem, Axe, Gladius, and Emu Rock - sourced from Cummins, Minnipa, Streaky Bay, Palmer, Pinnaroo and Turretfield.
It builds on work in the plant growth room at the Waite Institute where four generations of Krichauff and KRL19 have shown promising results by passing-down tolerance to salt stress compared with control plants.
"Some call it pre-adaptation," SARDI research scientist Yusuf Genc said.
"If poor conditions have embedded a change in the DNA somehow, then the next generation may pass it on and the plant may react to the environment accordingly.
"If it's grown under drought conditions for example, and the next generation experiences the same conditions, then it may trigger a set of events and respond with better yield and better adaptation."
With four generations of wheat varieties growing together, Dr Genc said it was "like time travel" - watching the effect of previous generations on the next generations at the same site.
"Epigenetics adds extra genetic diversity from which you can select.
"Hopefully we'll be able to show that this phenomenon has a place in agriculture"
* Full report in Stock Journal, September 26 issue, 2013.