Getting Plants ‘Drunk’ Insulates them Against Drought, According to New Research:
Main crop plants thrived when their soil was soaked in ethanol alcohols even after two weeks without water, report scientists. Many efforts have been tried to conserve staple plants including genetic modification of root systems and leaf stomata (pores). While these methods are effective to some extent it is too expensive. However, plants are known to produce ethanol when they are water-deprived and research done by the RIKEN Centre for Sustainable Resource Science in Japan has found that supplementing the soil with the compound can increase crop yields during drought. The results were quite staggering as they found that survival rates for plants increased by around 70% for rice and wheat in particular. The method is also extremely cheap compared to other options and provides a way for countries without proper capital to maintain staple crops.