Comments on: A debate between Vavilov and Lysenko

By: Nando

Nando — Sat, 29 May 2010 07:52:40 +0000

A new lecture on Lysenko and the genetics in the Soviet Union here:
http://www.ucm.es/info/nomadas/trip/lysenko.html

By: Dirk Enneking

Dirk Enneking — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 09:51:40 +0000

I’ve just come across a website that has some source material relevant to this discussion. Check it out

http://www.marxistsfr.org/subject/science/index.htm

By: Jacob

Jacob — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 14:00:31 +0000

I believe I read in a respectable book that Lysenko would sow wheat (or barley?) directly in the snow. Perhaps The Gulag Archipelago. Would that book one of the troublemakers adding to the confusion about the Lysenko vs. Vavilov "debate"? All my books except two are in boxes at this very moment, so perhaps someone can help out. In crop trials, soaking can be used to identify non-germinating seed and thus reduce the need of resowing to ensure synchrony and uniform density. An alternative is oversowing followed by thinning. Is that what you mean, Jeremy? Lysenko's pseudo-science seems superficially similar to Waddington's "genetic assimilation". That is about heat shocks and fruit flies instead of cold shocks and wheat. Waddington's classic paper on it was published in 1953, too late to educate Lysenko.

By: Jeremy

Jeremy — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 14:47:29 +0000

@Robert - I'm not sure soaking is incorrect. There are examples from modern practise of soaking seeds as a form of pre-germination that results in more uniform emergence, among other things. I suspect that something like this may have been responsible for the results Lysenko claimed, although these could often not be replicated. I wish I had the time and skills to be clearer on this. Maybe in a little while.

By: Robert

Robert — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 13:54:44 +0000

Given Lysenko's interest in vernalization (wikipedia), I suspect that the word "soaking" is an incorrect translation.

By: Jeremy

Jeremy — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 13:38:30 +0000

@Robert - I'm not competent to comment on the Russian word that was translated as vernalization, but of course you are right, it is an important aspect of many aspects of plant dormancy. As to why the focus on winter wheats, I simply don't know.

By: Robert

Robert — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 13:22:38 +0000

In the context of that harrowing dialog, this point is perhaps not worth making, but vernalization normally refers to plant development in response to low temperatures. It can indeed by artificially used, like in the 5 graden tulpen, or "5 degree tulips" in the Netherlands. The bulbs are put in cold chambers of that temperature before planting them in hothouses to produce (unseasonally early) tulips flowers for the Christmas season. Now this type of early flowering is not heritable, of course. And why in Karl's name did Lysenko care to try with winter wheat? He must have known of spring wheat; or was that against doctrine?