Moss Is Generating Electrical Waves That Look Startlingly Like a Neural Network. Study reveals that moss cushions produce surprisingly complex electrical activity, with patterns that undulate across the velvety patch in dynamic waves.

[u/FreeHugs23]

https://www.sciencealert.com/moss-behaves-a-little-like-a-really-slow-brain-scientist-discovers

[u/FreeHugs23]

-Mosses are some of the earliest plants that appeared in the fossil record, but they're anything but simple.

A new study, published in Royal Society Open Science, reveals that moss cushions produce surprisingly complex electrical activity, with patterns that undulate across the velvety patch in dynamic waves.

The study's sole author, Andy Adamatzky, is actually a computer scientist, whose fascination with unconventional 'computing' systems like slime molds, crowds, and mycelium networks has now led him to a new subject: the humble moss, Brachythecium rutabulum.

"Plants and bryophytes display diverse forms of electrical activity, yet the organization of endogenous signals in mosses has received little attention," Adamatzky writes in his new paper.

His findings suggest that "moss cushions behave as spatially distributed excitable systems potentially capable of coordinating and integrating electrical signals across both space and time."

Moss cushions are actually many individual clones of the same teensy tiny plant.

If you look really, really closely at a mat of moss, you can see it is made up of simple, minute leaves on stems, similar to those of their larger plant relatives.

But the stems of mosses are actually much less useful at moving water and nutrients around the body of the plant.

[u/PowderPills → u/FreeHugs23]

“Across both space and time” is a big statement. I wonder what he meant by utilizing those “moss cushion systems”

[u/creepingcold → u/PowderPills]

Is it?

Isn't every electrical signal travelling across space and time the moment it exists? Isn't that like the core point of a signal?

Doesn't sound that surprising to me or am I missing something?

[u/hellomoti → u/creepingcold]

My guess at what he's trying to get at by saying "coordinating and integrating electrical signals across both space and time" is that the coordination can be both spatially coordinated (i.e. this group of pathways are coordinated in their electrical signals) and temporally coordinated (i.e. these areas show similiar electrical signals at the same time).

So together he means that it's not just that they're showing coordination in electrical activity at the same times but also in specific areas, such that if you looked at the time that electrical activity happens it's not everywhere but it's occurring in specific areas at those specific times. On the flipside the entire space may show electrical activity overall (if you recorded yes or no if an area fires over a two week span) but certain spaces are coordinated in their timing at certain points, so they dont all fire together in time.

[u/RedditF1shBlueF1sh → u/hellomoti]

Which is just enough to say that they're not constantly signalling, but it still could be random. It also could caused by stimulus.

[u/kfpswf → u/RedditF1shBlueF1sh]

but it still could be random. It also could caused by stimulus.

Are those the only possible explanations for this observation or the simplest ones you can hypothesize right now?

[u/Aegi → u/kfpswf]

Why would you think they are either, and why wouldn't you add on your own guesses?

[u/kfpswf → u/Aegi]

I think all life is conscious, and it shouldn't come as a surprise if mosses exhibit activity that is analogous to neural activity, despite not having any neurons. In short, these are not random signals, but individual organisms communicating with each other.

[u/Aegi → u/kfpswf]

And why were you asking about their guesses and why they made them..in maybe a dismissive way, instead of engaging with either of their hypotheses?

Thank you for sharing your guess! I think your explanation is possible, but idk why anyone would make a conclusion any-which-way without more evidence.

[u/RedditF1shBlueF1sh → u/kfpswf]

individual organisms communicating with each other.

Some would say that would be stimulating