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Ted is no shrinking violet. It can extend nearly
nine feet high. But it produces a bloom only every few years and that
bloom stays around only for a day or so. Nearly 1,000 people witnessed
the plant's short-lived performance last week at the University of
California, Davis, C&EN reports. Originally, the plant was
discovered in Sumatra.
"We've had two people gagging already," Ernesto
Sandoval, the Davis conservatory's curator cheerfully reported,
shortly after the group gathered for the historic event. As the aroma
— described by some as like rotten eggs laid by a decaying chicken in
a clogged drainpipe-wafted through the hall, several other people
began gagging, according to C&EN.
The precise chemistry of Ted's odor hasn't really
been explained as yet, but some scientists have some strong suspicions.
UC Davis plant biology professor Terence M. Murphy says tests on other
related plants reveal compounds that have a characteristic rotting
meat smell, such as dimethyl trisulfide. And they also have detected
amines in related plants with such names as putrescine and cadaverine,
which also are produced by rotting meat.
UC Davis entomology professor Bruce D. Hammock says
he hopes to solve the mystery soon. He says he realized no one was
doing chemical analyses of the plant so he and some colleagues are
running a series of tests, the newsmagazine says. They're still
waiting for the results, but as Hammock puts it: "my nose as a chemist
tells me [the compounds are] sulfur heterocyclic amines because it
smells like three dead sheep."
A number of plants around the world have evolved
using this strange system of attracting flies, rather than bees. These
stinkers pull in the flies, which are in a "euphoric, confused state"
looking for places to deposit their eggs," according to Sandoval. In
so doing, they pick up pollen from the plant's male parts, deposit it
on the female parts, and thus fertilize it.
Besides UC Davis a handful of botanical gardens
worldwide cultivate Ted. "Mr. Stinky" resides at the Fairfield
Tropical Garden in Coral Gables, Fla.; "Tiny" lives at UC Santa
Barbara; and other plants are cultivated at Huntington Botanical
Gardens, Pasadena, and in Bonn, Germany, according to C&EN.
Once scientists isolate the compounds that make Ted
stink, what potential uses do they anticipate? "Maybe as fly
attractants," observes Murphy. |
