Modeling root system growth around obstacles
Date
2020Author
Jin, Wencheng
Aufrecht, Jayde
Patino-Ramirez, Fernando
Cabral, Heidy
Arson, Chloé
Retterer, Scott
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
State-of-the-Art models of Root System Architecture (RSA) do not allow simulating root growth around rigid obstacles. Yet, the
presence of obstacles can be highly disruptive to the root system. We grew wheat seedlings in sealed petri dishes without
obstacle and in custom 3D-printed rhizoboxes containing obstacles. Time-lapse photography was used to reconstruct the
wheat root morphology network. We used the reconstructed wheat root network without obstacle to calibrate an RSA model
implemented in the R-SWMS software. The root network with obstacle allowed calibrating the parameters of a new function that
models the influence of rigid obstacles on wheat root growth. Experimental results show that the presence of a rigid obstacle
does not affect the growth rate of the wheat root axes, but that it does influence the root trajectory after the main axis has
passed the obstacle. The growth recovery time, i.e. the time for the main root axis to recover its geotropism-driven growth, is
proportional to the time during which the main axis grows along the obstacle. Qualitative and quantitative comparisons between
experimental and numerical results show that the proposed model successfully simulates wheat RSA growth around obstacles.
Our results suggest that wheat roots follow patterns that could inspire the design of adaptive engineering flow networks.