Objectives
Plants do not take advantage of all the sunlight that they receive. Those light wavelength fractions that correspond with green are not absorbed by plant leaves and thus are reflected, giving them their characteristic colour. Chemical substances called fluorophores can re-emit light that they have absorbed. When these substances are added to greenhouse plastics, they offer the possibility of catching light of the green spectrum and re-emitting it in wavelengths that are absorbed by plants. The INRA institute of horticulture and seeds research in Angers (France) is conducting a project together with CASCADE company who develops the fluorophores and Agripolyane company (an important producer of plastics for agriculture), aimed at testing the efficiency of greenhouse plastics enriched with fluorophores in promoting plant growth.
Objectives
N/A
Additional information
Fluophores are chemical substances that can emit light when excited by it. When they are embedded in greenhouse plastics, they offer the possibility of transforming sunlight wavelengths that are not assimilated by plants into light which promotes photosynthesis. The INRA institute of horticulture and seeds research in Angers has been testing how these plastics can increase productivity in a melon crop.
Fluophores are degraded by ultraviolet light and currently last a month. Researchers are currently testing plastics with fluorophores that can last a whole growing season.
In spite of the shortcomings to be tackled, tests in the melon crop have shown an increase of a 7% of melon production in comparison to melons produced in a greenhouse covered with conventional plastics. Melons also got ripe earlier and had higher sugar content. Fluophores offer the possibility of regulating the wavelength that the crop receives and thus adapt it to the type of plants to produce and the plant characteristics to improve. This would allow for example fostering flowering, crop yield or the taste of the vegetable.
Project details
- Main funding source
- Other public (national, regional) research funds
- Project acronym
- ORCA
- Agricultural sectors
- Vegetables
Contacts
Jean-Pierre Renou
Project coordinator
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Institut de recherche en horticulture et semences, IRHS. Inra Angers-Nantes
Project coordinator
Project partners
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société CASCADE
Project partner
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société AGRIPOLYANE
Project partner