Paper published in Plant Physiol. Rep.
Nature green with avarice and greed
Roger C. Prince, Graham N. George, and Amy L. Stevens
Plants require adequate light to grow, but once the sun is above the horizon they typically absorb far more light than they can possibly use. We argue that this is the result of a selection pressure to ‘beggar their neighbors’ and stop them competing for other resources such as land, water and nutrients. This complements the famous quote that ‘Nature (is) red in tooth and claw’—Nature is also ‘Green with avarice and greed’.