Since the 1940’s cannabis farmers and others have been using Thiamine (B1) as a root soak to relieve “transplant shock” and other things, despite that it clearly says “Trees” on the label.
I’ve been unable to locate any evidence that it works for that purpose,
But don’t toss those bottles out just yet.
According to this 2005 study, B1 is indeed good for plants,
we were just using it wrong!
According to this study performed at the School of Agricultural Biotechnology and Center for Agricultural Biomaterials, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea, Vitamin B1 has a very strong ability to suppress bacterial and viral infections.
You can get a copy of the entire 15 page study here. download the .PDF
The following are my favorite little clips, edited (by me) for easier reading and to create a condensed version of the 15 page document.
Vitamin B1 Functions as an Activator of Plant Disease Resistance
We demonstrate here that thiamine induces systemic acquired resistance (SAR) in plants.
Thiamine-treated rice, and vegetable crop plants showed resistance to fungal, bacterial, and viral infections.
Thiamine treatment induces the transient expression of pathogenesis-related (PR) genes in rice and other plants. In addition, thiamine treatment potentiates stronger and more rapid PR gene expression and the up-regulation of protein kinase C activity.
The effects of thiamine on disease resistance lasts for more than 15 days after treatment.
Thiamine Exerts Its Effects Systemically through the Calcium-Dependent Signaling Pathway indicating that the effect of thiamine mobilizes to other parts of the plant.
Plants are continually exposed to pathogen attack and have developed an innate surveillance mechanism that enables them to rapidly ward off attempted invasions by pathogens.
The key differences between the compatible (susceptible) and incompatible (resistant) interactions are the timely recognition of pathogen attack and the rapid, appropriate expression of defense responses. In incompatible interactions, the plant’s resistance (R) gene product signals that plant to produce a sequence of compounds that lead to a rapid form of cell death termed hypersensitive response (HR).
HR cell death is triggered through an increase in the intracellular cytosolic Ca21 concentration by an influx of external Ca21 and the secretion of Ca21 from the calcium stores into the cytoplasm, a burst of reactive oxygen species, changes in the extracellular pH and membrane potentials, and variations in protein phosphorylation patterns. Finally, key mediators such as salicylic acid (SA) accumulate, and resistance is induced systemically.
HR eliminates infected host cells that support continuous plant-pathogen interactions. The plant begins to express a subset of pathogenesis-related (PR) genes locally at the point of infection, and induced resistance develops systemically…
Whew! That was a brain bender!
In English, what that means is… the plant is able to sense the invading pathogen and then quickly kill it’s own cells in the vicinity surrounding the attack, which isolates the invading pathogen and keeps it from spreading.
Systemic acquired resistance (SAR) is enhanced resistance against many but not all fungal, bacterial, and viral pathogens. SAR is generally triggered by a hypersensitive response pathogen-induced localized cell death (HR), which occurs as local lesions and can spread over the entire plant. SAR induces long-lasting, efficient resistance against a broad spectrum of pathogens. SAR could serve as a basis for novel disease control strategies.
How Thiamine induces disease resistance in plants.
The term “Mock” indicates the plants that did NOT get the treatment of Thiamin.
Given the disease-progress-inhibiting activities of thiamine against fungal, bacterial, and viral pathogens, it would be unusual if this compound acted as a specific antibiotic.
Media containing thiamine did not inhibit the growth of M. grisea or X. oryzae pv oryzae on plates. These results imply that thiamine induces resistance in plants, without directly affecting the pathogens.
This is a very important point because it shows that thiamine
is not directly effective against any pathogen on it’s own.
~
It induces the plant to be resistant.
Broad-spectrum effects and the absence of direct effects on the pathogen are distinctive characteristics of plant defense activators that induce systemic acquired resistance (SAR).
In addition, thiamine did not result in phytotoxicity at any of the tested concentrations.
Taken together, our results demonstrate a novel biological function for thiamine. Thiamine confers disease resistance through the priming of several plant defense responses, leading to a restriction of pathogen growth in plants and suppressed propagation of the pathogen.”
The maintenance of the resistance for a long period (15 days), indicates that thiamine is a good candidate as a plant defense activation agent.
Published by: American Society of Plant Biologists, Plant Physiology, July 2005, Vol. 138, pp. 1505–1515, www.plantphysiol.org Authors: Il-Pyung Ahn, Soonok Kim, Yong-Hwan Lee doi/10.1104/pp.104.058693
2 thoughts on “Vitamin B1 Activates Plant Disease Resistance!”
Thanks for the reply Matthew.
Trying to put that in regular English… please correct me if I’m wrong, but here’s what I think you just said…
1) You think Botrytus, some Powdery Mildew species, and Viruses may have attack mechanisms that are too sophisticated for this Thiamine induced SAR to prevent infection.
2) Increasing a plant’s normal immune ability could have unforeseen consequences by actually making it so strong as to repel beneficial symbiotic interactions with microbes. This could possibly negate some or all of the organic living soil symbiotic relationships, as well as those we might get from introducing a commercial biological product containing the common Bacillus and Mycorrhizae species we use on Cannabis.
Is that anywhere close to what you said?
Hypersensitive response and other facets of SAR are as stated, only as good as the immune system response in total. For many of the more virulent pathogens and their host plant cultivars, Thiamine will barely slow the progress of ingress since their virulence factors are so sophisticated and vast such as with Botrytis species, plant viruses, and some powdery mildews. It may have overlapping effects with arthropod pests as well.
The Phylosymbiosis and Hologenome Theories recognize that the microbiome of species and their close relatives is modulated by the strength and unique properties of the immune system in a salient way. An immune system that is too strong in certain ways may disallow both detrimental and potentially beneficial microbes, and changes to SAR and immune system deployment can have unforeseen consequences to the microbiome holistically.