June 14, 2024 • 14 mins
What if the key to unlocking your garden's full potential lies in a light spectrum most people overlook? Discover the untapped power of far-red radiation in horticulture as we bring you a vibrant discussion straight from the ASHS 2022 Workshop, "What Is Far-Red Light's Role in Plant Science?" Join co-host Sam Humphrey in a fantastic conversation with Dr. John Ertle, who shares his firsthand experience being surrounded by the leading minds in plant science. Feel the buzz and excitement of a packed room where every corner was brimming with curiosity and groundbreaking insights.
In this episode, John Ertle recounts his journey from a master's project on vegetable grafting to engaging with top scientists about the nuances of far-red light. From the thrill of securing a seat behind the renowned Bruce Bugbee to the dynamic, open discussions among students and professors alike, John paints a vivid picture of the workshop's atmosphere. Listen as we uncover how this relatively obscure topic is making waves in controlled environment agriculture. This episode promises a front-row seat to the complexities and possibilities that far-red radiation holds for the future of horticulture.
ASHS 2022 Workshop What Is Far-Red Light's Role in Plant Science? https://ashs.confex.com/ashs/2022/meetingapp.cgi/Session/11349
Learn more about the American Society for Horticultural Science (ASHS) at https://ashs.org/.
HortTechnology, HortScience and the Journal of the American Society for Horticultural Science are all open-access and peer-reviewed journals, published by the American Society of Horticultural Science (ASHS). Find them at journals.ashs.org.
Consider becoming an ASHS member at https://ashs.org/page/Becomeamember!
You can also find the official webpage for Plants, People, Science at ashs.org/plantspeoplesciencepodcast, and we encourage you to send us feedback or suggestions at https://ashs.org/webinarpodcastsuggestion.
Podcast transcripts are available at https://plantspeoplescience.buzzsprout.com.
On LinkedIn find Sam Humphrey at linkedin.com/in/samson-humphrey. Curt Rom is at https://www.linkedin.com/in/curt-rom-611085134/. Lena Wilson is at https://www.linkedin.com/in/lena-wilson-2531a5141/.
Thank you for listening!
...
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Curt Rom (00:17):
Welcome to Plants, people Science, a podcast of the
American Society forHorticultural Science where we
talk about all thingshorticulture.
I'm Curt Rom from theUniversity of Arkansas, your
co-host for the podcast, alongwith co-host Samson Humphrey
from North Carolina StateUniversity.
So, Sam, what brings ustogether today?
Samson Humphrey (00:39):
In our last episode we talked with Dr Eric
Runkle about far-red radiationand how it affects plants.
It was a very science-focusedepisode from this researcher
who's super knowledgeable andhas been researching far-red for
decades now.
But we wanted to add a littlebit of color.
What was it like to be agraduate student in the room
(00:59):
during that famous ASHS far-redworkshop?
So I sat down with John Ertleand we discussed Far Red and his
experience being there in theroom with all those important
scientists for this reallyimportant discussion.
Curt Rom (01:15):
Well, Sam, I look forward to hearing the color in
the conversation about Far RedLight.
Samson Humphrey (01:25):
John Ertle.
Dr John Ertle, welcome to thepodcast.
Well, thank you very much, Sam.
So we invited you to come onthe show and talk about Far Red
because you were one of thestudents present in the workshop
about Far Red Light at the 2022ASHS conference.
I'm curious why were you there?
Why did you attend the workshop?
John Ertle (01:46):
Yeah, so at that particular conference I went to
present some of my research PhDresearch at the time and I was
fortunate enough to see thateverybody was migrating into
this Far Red workshop and I wascurious about it and I'd heard a
lot about Far Red lately, andso I just happened to be in the
(02:06):
right place at the right timeand got to step in for that very
lively discussion.
Samson Humphrey (02:12):
Oh, that's amazing.
So you were a controlledenvironment researcher at the
time, right?
John Ertle (02:18):
Yeah, so I was in Chieri Kubota's lab at the Ohio
State University.
I joined her lab in 2018 for amaster's, which I first worked
on vegetable grafting sofruiting vegetable crops and
stress tolerance and then, onceI was finished with that project
the end of my master's I stuckaround to do a PhD with Cherry
(02:39):
on her Optimia grant, which wasa multi-state Optimia grant,
which was a multi-state,multi-institute grant to improve
leafy green profitability andcrop physiology inside of
controlled environments.
And so I worked on tip burn.
So I got to look at lettuce asit was growing in these
controlled environments and seethis calcium deficiency emerge
(03:02):
in the leaves that causes thispoor appearance and
marketability and limits thecrop growth.
So I got to work very deeply inthat field and growing
exclusively in controlledenvironments for a long period
of time.
Samson Humphrey (03:20):
I mean from how I understand it.
So you and I have been friendsfor a couple of years now and in
my mind you're the guy who washelping everyone out, who was
helping with other projects andwho was very knowledgeable on
lots of topics, including lightof your PhD, who's very
(03:47):
knowledgeable about many ofthese topics, especially light.
What was it like walking intothis room of scientists and
students and industry members?
What was it like to actually bethere?
John Ertle (03:54):
Well, it was actually really exciting.
So the room was packed.
It was standing room only inthe back.
I was fortunate enough to get aseat just behind Bruce Bugbee,
which was always fun, and thegroup was kind of excited
talking about the idea offar-red photons and how they
interact with plants and thephysiology, and so the group was
(04:19):
kind of mixture of students allthe way to, you know, tenured
professors, and, and no realseparation between any of the
groups, and so it was just kindof like this, you know, exciting
atmosphere of everybody in thisfield, interested in, this,
(04:39):
what would have been relativelyobscure topic to the, to the
general public, but we were allthere to learn and it was
really exciting to sit in thatroom with so many knowledgeable
people also doing the same thing.
Samson Humphrey (04:53):
Yeah, those rooms could hold, I think, like
80 or so people.
So if you're standing in theback, they were quite a big
number.
John Ertle (05:00):
It was quite challenging to squeeze everyone
in, but it was real cool to seeeverybody stick around to the
end of the day for that meeting.
Samson Humphrey (05:18):
The format of this workshop had some speakers
right and then there was like anopen discussion with people
talking and asking questions.
Did any students get to askquestions?
John Ertle (05:25):
Yeah, and I vaguely remember asking one at some
point myself, but I can'tremember for the life of me what
it was.
But there were quite a fewstudents asking questions and
just as many professors, andsometimes you go to these
meetings and you know you getkind of a few questions volleyed
at you, but this just seemedlike nonstop, like the
(05:46):
discussion portion of this wasgoing all day and you know
speakers were still up theregetting ready to answer
questions through the end ofthat.
That worked up and a little bitbeyond, I think so.
But everybody was askingquestions and there are lots of
little discussions, sidediscussions, at tables too.
Samson Humphrey (06:04):
Oh really, I didn't know there were side
discussions.
That's so I like.
Yeah, when I attend conferences, typically I'm attending, you
know, talks and someone speaksand people ask questions, but
it's not as lively usually asthis one sounds.
(06:24):
That's so funny.
I'm curious.
What did you learn from theexperience?
John Ertle (06:31):
So I learned a lot about how, you know, these
far-red photons are interactingwith the plants and gas exchange
of these crops, and how thatlight, in addition to par
photons, would interact with theplant versus far-red light by
itself or just par photons bythemselves.
(06:53):
And we kind of just startedbuilding the logical case that
far red can bephotosynthetically active in
conditions around the leaf andaround the plants.
And there was some reallyreally really good data
presented about, you know,demonstrating that effect.
And then discussion even goingback further to older literature
(07:15):
where this was kind of looselytalked about but also broadly
ignored by the scientificcommunity for a while, and there
were, you know kind of someexperiments that led to the
conclusion that you know, thisis not directly that valuable,
because when we shine just farred light on these plants,
nothing really happens, butmissing that critical component
(07:36):
of adding in PAR photons.
And so then we kind of wereable to reconstruct the
arguments leading to why thattopic was sort of shelled for a
while.
And then now what new evidencethere is to bring that into a
new light, for lack of a better,less ironic term, a new
(07:57):
radiation, yes, well a new lightfor lack of a better less
ironic term A new radiation.
Samson Humphrey (08:07):
That's so interesting because most talks
are.
You know, this is what I'mcurrently doing, but not going
so deeply into the history.
That sounds incredible.
John Ertle (08:12):
Yeah, there are some professors in our field and
other individuals that arereally good at this, like Bruce
Bugbee obviously, will get upand he'll talk about the history
of lighting and for 10 minutesor so it's just like a
fascinating kind of dive intowhat we thought the limits were
of controlled environments basedaround lighting based around
(08:39):
lighting.
And it's really cool to kind ofmix in that history with the
science, because I think thatgives it a sort of extra oomph
in how we look at the scientificprocess and why we have
differing conclusions atdiffering times throughout
history about certain topics.
But we can kind of, you know,come to new understanding about
(09:00):
that information.
Samson Humphrey (09:02):
Yeah, wow.
So it's funny to me that nowyou so you're talking about how
far red can increase and canaffect photosynthesis and other
physiological processes, and nowthat is what you do.
Since that workshop you'vegraduated with your PhD and
(09:23):
you've been hired as a plantphysiologist at PP Systems.
So for our listeners, that is acompany that designs and
manufactures state-of-the-artportable photosynthesis systems.
So you've taken all of yourexperiences publishing and
discussing science at ASHSconferences and you've started
the next chapter of yourscientific career.
That's right.
(09:44):
I'm curious what are you up toright now?
John Ertle (09:48):
Yeah, so, um, uh, today actually looks very
similar to a day in my PhD.
I'm currently running alighting experiment just to look
at some interesting effects, oninteresting effects on some
plants that I have growing in myoffice, and then I'm also, this
afternoon, going to go down andstart working on a new project
(10:08):
that we just picked up.
So just in the last few weeks Iacquired a shipping container
vertical farm, and so now I'mgoing to greatly expand my plant
growing capacity as I start tokind of build the lab capable of
doing research here, and we'revery excited to see that next
chapter open up.
Samson Humphrey (10:30):
What sort of research do you want to do?
Will it be lighting research inthat shipping container farm?
John Ertle (10:35):
Well, I think lighting research is sort of an
easy fruit to start grabbing atin the early days here.
There are some otherexperiments I'd like to do, but
there may be some creative sortof approaches to that.
And as far as proving out that,you know, our container works
(10:56):
as we need it to, I'll probablystart with doing some kind of
lighting experiment and I'd liketo look at far red specifically
to see what kind ofphysiological data I can gather
about these crops throughouttheir life cycle.
Samson Humphrey (11:11):
There are so many things to be excited about
in horticulture, so manydifferent like topics and little
areas that you can be creativein and that you can ask
questions about.
So, as a student, seeing youactually like getting funding
and getting facilities andstarting to create your own
(11:33):
research program at this company, it's really exciting to see.
John Ertle (11:37):
Yes, it is a very creative process on the industry
side sometimes.
So, even getting this container, we were exploring options
about different controlledenvironment setups we could
build here, or what things wecould purchase and equipment we
needed, and the cost started tototal very high very quickly.
(12:01):
So in this case I was able tofind a rather unique opportunity
to buy this equipment.
So there was a company thatwent out of business and they
liquidated their holdings.
I was able to purchase thischamber in their auction
aftermath, so that worked outvery well for me.
But still there's a lot more wecould do and so I'm going to
(12:23):
try and continue channeling thatcreativity and growing this
side of the business.
Samson Humphrey (12:30):
John Ertle.
Thank you so much for coming onthe podcast.
This was fantastic.
John Ertle (12:34):
It was great to talk to you.
Thank you so much for invitingme.
Curt Rom (12:46):
The ASHS podcast Plants, People, Science is made
possible by member dues andvolunteerism.
Science is made possible bymember dues and volunteerism.
Please go to ashs.
org to learn more.
If you're not already a memberof the ASHS, we invite you to
join.
ASHS is a not-for-profit andyour donations are
(13:08):
tax-deductible.
Samson Humphrey (13:09):
This episode was hosted by Samson Curt Rom
and .
Special thanks to our audioengineer, A andrew Scheldorf,
our research specialists LenaWilson and Andrew Scheldorf, our
ASHS support team, S ara Powelland Sally Murphy, and our
musician, J ohn Clark.
Thanks for listening.
Guitar solo.
Thank you.
Welcome to Plants, people Science, a podcast of the
American Society forHorticultural Science where we
talk about all thingshorticulture.
I'm Curt Rom from theUniversity of Arkansas, your
co-host for the podcast, alongwith co-host Samson Humphrey
from North Carolina StateUniversity.
So, Sam, what brings ustogether today?
Samson Humphrey (00:39):
In our last episode we talked with Dr Eric
Runkle about far-red radiationand how it affects plants.
It was a very science-focusedepisode from this researcher
who's super knowledgeable andhas been researching far-red for
decades now.
But we wanted to add a littlebit of color.
What was it like to be agraduate student in the room
(00:59):
during that famous ASHS far-redworkshop?
So I sat down with John Ertleand we discussed Far Red and his
experience being there in theroom with all those important
scientists for this reallyimportant discussion.
Curt Rom (01:15):
Well, Sam, I look forward to hearing the color in
the conversation about Far RedLight.
Samson Humphrey (01:25):
John Ertle.
Dr John Ertle, welcome to thepodcast.
Well, thank you very much, Sam.
So we invited you to come onthe show and talk about Far Red
because you were one of thestudents present in the workshop
about Far Red Light at the 2022ASHS conference.
I'm curious why were you there?
Why did you attend the workshop?
John Ertle (01:46):
Yeah, so at that particular conference I went to
present some of my research PhDresearch at the time and I was
fortunate enough to see thateverybody was migrating into
this Far Red workshop and I wascurious about it and I'd heard a
lot about Far Red lately, andso I just happened to be in the
(02:06):
right place at the right timeand got to step in for that very
lively discussion.
Samson Humphrey (02:12):
Oh, that's amazing.
So you were a controlledenvironment researcher at the
time, right?
John Ertle (02:18):
Yeah, so I was in Chieri Kubota's lab at the Ohio
State University.
I joined her lab in 2018 for amaster's, which I first worked
on vegetable grafting sofruiting vegetable crops and
stress tolerance and then, onceI was finished with that project
the end of my master's I stuckaround to do a PhD with Cherry
(02:39):
on her Optimia grant, which wasa multi-state Optimia grant,
which was a multi-state,multi-institute grant to improve
leafy green profitability andcrop physiology inside of
controlled environments.
And so I worked on tip burn.
So I got to look at lettuce asit was growing in these
controlled environments and seethis calcium deficiency emerge
(03:02):
in the leaves that causes thispoor appearance and
marketability and limits thecrop growth.
So I got to work very deeply inthat field and growing
exclusively in controlledenvironments for a long period
of time.
Samson Humphrey (03:20):
I mean from how I understand it.
So you and I have been friendsfor a couple of years now and in
my mind you're the guy who washelping everyone out, who was
helping with other projects andwho was very knowledgeable on
lots of topics, including lightof your PhD, who's very
(03:47):
knowledgeable about many ofthese topics, especially light.
What was it like walking intothis room of scientists and
students and industry members?
What was it like to actually bethere?
John Ertle (03:54):
Well, it was actually really exciting.
So the room was packed.
It was standing room only inthe back.
I was fortunate enough to get aseat just behind Bruce Bugbee,
which was always fun, and thegroup was kind of excited
talking about the idea offar-red photons and how they
interact with plants and thephysiology, and so the group was
(04:19):
kind of mixture of students allthe way to, you know, tenured
professors, and, and no realseparation between any of the
groups, and so it was just kindof like this, you know, exciting
atmosphere of everybody in thisfield, interested in, this,
(04:39):
what would have been relativelyobscure topic to the, to the
general public, but we were allthere to learn and it was
really exciting to sit in thatroom with so many knowledgeable
people also doing the same thing.
Samson Humphrey (04:53):
Yeah, those rooms could hold, I think, like
80 or so people.
So if you're standing in theback, they were quite a big
number.
John Ertle (05:00):
It was quite challenging to squeeze everyone
in, but it was real cool to seeeverybody stick around to the
end of the day for that meeting.
Samson Humphrey (05:18):
The format of this workshop had some speakers
right and then there was like anopen discussion with people
talking and asking questions.
Did any students get to askquestions?
John Ertle (05:25):
Yeah, and I vaguely remember asking one at some
point myself, but I can'tremember for the life of me what
it was.
But there were quite a fewstudents asking questions and
just as many professors, andsometimes you go to these
meetings and you know you getkind of a few questions volleyed
at you, but this just seemedlike nonstop, like the
(05:46):
discussion portion of this wasgoing all day and you know
speakers were still up theregetting ready to answer
questions through the end ofthat.
That worked up and a little bitbeyond, I think so.
But everybody was askingquestions and there are lots of
little discussions, sidediscussions, at tables too.
Samson Humphrey (06:04):
Oh really, I didn't know there were side
discussions.
That's so I like.
Yeah, when I attend conferences, typically I'm attending, you
know, talks and someone speaksand people ask questions, but
it's not as lively usually asthis one sounds.
(06:24):
That's so funny.
I'm curious.
What did you learn from theexperience?
John Ertle (06:31):
So I learned a lot about how, you know, these
far-red photons are interactingwith the plants and gas exchange
of these crops, and how thatlight, in addition to par
photons, would interact with theplant versus far-red light by
itself or just par photons bythemselves.
(06:53):
And we kind of just startedbuilding the logical case that
far red can bephotosynthetically active in
conditions around the leaf andaround the plants.
And there was some reallyreally really good data
presented about, you know,demonstrating that effect.
And then discussion even goingback further to older literature
(07:15):
where this was kind of looselytalked about but also broadly
ignored by the scientificcommunity for a while, and there
were, you know kind of someexperiments that led to the
conclusion that you know, thisis not directly that valuable,
because when we shine just farred light on these plants,
nothing really happens, butmissing that critical component
(07:36):
of adding in PAR photons.
And so then we kind of wereable to reconstruct the
arguments leading to why thattopic was sort of shelled for a
while.
And then now what new evidencethere is to bring that into a
new light, for lack of a better,less ironic term, a new
(07:57):
radiation, yes, well a new lightfor lack of a better less
ironic term A new radiation.
Samson Humphrey (08:07):
That's so interesting because most talks
are.
You know, this is what I'mcurrently doing, but not going
so deeply into the history.
That sounds incredible.
John Ertle (08:12):
Yeah, there are some professors in our field and
other individuals that arereally good at this, like Bruce
Bugbee obviously, will get upand he'll talk about the history
of lighting and for 10 minutesor so it's just like a
fascinating kind of dive intowhat we thought the limits were
of controlled environments basedaround lighting based around
(08:39):
lighting.
And it's really cool to kind ofmix in that history with the
science, because I think thatgives it a sort of extra oomph
in how we look at the scientificprocess and why we have
differing conclusions atdiffering times throughout
history about certain topics.
But we can kind of, you know,come to new understanding about
(09:00):
that information.
Samson Humphrey (09:02):
Yeah, wow.
So it's funny to me that nowyou so you're talking about how
far red can increase and canaffect photosynthesis and other
physiological processes, and nowthat is what you do.
Since that workshop you'vegraduated with your PhD and
(09:23):
you've been hired as a plantphysiologist at PP Systems.
So for our listeners, that is acompany that designs and
manufactures state-of-the-artportable photosynthesis systems.
So you've taken all of yourexperiences publishing and
discussing science at ASHSconferences and you've started
the next chapter of yourscientific career.
That's right.
(09:44):
I'm curious what are you up toright now?
John Ertle (09:48):
Yeah, so, um, uh, today actually looks very
similar to a day in my PhD.
I'm currently running alighting experiment just to look
at some interesting effects, oninteresting effects on some
plants that I have growing in myoffice, and then I'm also, this
afternoon, going to go down andstart working on a new project
(10:08):
that we just picked up.
So just in the last few weeks Iacquired a shipping container
vertical farm, and so now I'mgoing to greatly expand my plant
growing capacity as I start tokind of build the lab capable of
doing research here, and we'revery excited to see that next
chapter open up.
Samson Humphrey (10:30):
What sort of research do you want to do?
Will it be lighting research inthat shipping container farm?
John Ertle (10:35):
Well, I think lighting research is sort of an
easy fruit to start grabbing atin the early days here.
There are some otherexperiments I'd like to do, but
there may be some creative sortof approaches to that.
And as far as proving out that,you know, our container works
(10:56):
as we need it to, I'll probablystart with doing some kind of
lighting experiment and I'd liketo look at far red specifically
to see what kind ofphysiological data I can gather
about these crops throughouttheir life cycle.
Samson Humphrey (11:11):
There are so many things to be excited about
in horticulture, so manydifferent like topics and little
areas that you can be creativein and that you can ask
questions about.
So, as a student, seeing youactually like getting funding
and getting facilities andstarting to create your own
(11:33):
research program at this company, it's really exciting to see.
John Ertle (11:37):
Yes, it is a very creative process on the industry
side sometimes.
So, even getting this container, we were exploring options
about different controlledenvironment setups we could
build here, or what things wecould purchase and equipment we
needed, and the cost started tototal very high very quickly.
(12:01):
So in this case I was able tofind a rather unique opportunity
to buy this equipment.
So there was a company thatwent out of business and they
liquidated their holdings.
I was able to purchase thischamber in their auction
aftermath, so that worked outvery well for me.
But still there's a lot more wecould do and so I'm going to
(12:23):
try and continue channeling thatcreativity and growing this
side of the business.
Samson Humphrey (12:30):
John Ertle.
Thank you so much for coming onthe podcast.
This was fantastic.
John Ertle (12:34):
It was great to talk to you.
Thank you so much for invitingme.
Curt Rom (12:46):
The ASHS podcast Plants, People, Science is made
possible by member dues andvolunteerism.
Science is made possible bymember dues and volunteerism.
Please go to ashs.
org to learn more.
If you're not already a memberof the ASHS, we invite you to
join.
ASHS is a not-for-profit andyour donations are
(13:08):
tax-deductible.
Samson Humphrey (13:09):
This episode was hosted by Samson Curt Rom
and .
Special thanks to our audioengineer, A andrew Scheldorf,
our research specialists LenaWilson and Andrew Scheldorf, our
ASHS support team, S ara Powelland Sally Murphy, and our
musician, J ohn Clark.
Thanks for listening.
Guitar solo.
Thank you.
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