Farmers struggle to get their crops and seeds planted to germinate quickly. When seeds are dormant, they wait for just the right conditions before germinating. Often environmental stresses like not enough moisture (drought) or lack of oxygen make seeds wait until conditions improve. Seeds have built-in mechanism that prevents them from germinating too soon. This cautious seed germination approach also tends to hurt plant yields, because plants gets off to a late start. Dr. Brad Binder, University of Tennessee has been working with various plant seeds and the plant hormone ethylene to study seed germination. Ethylene increases seed germination, increases leaf growth, and root growth early in a plant’s life. When applied later in the growing season, ethylene causes plants to mature quicker (senescence) or die off and it promotes fruit ripening. Dr. Binder exposed tomato, cucumber, and wheat seeds to ethylene in the dark just like when seeds are planted and found that when the seeds...