Awesome! I knew something like this had to exist, but never acquired the math skills or the time to dig seriously for it, though I did have a lot of fun render quaternions along the way. I wonder if the techniques used for this could help us in reverse-engineering of DNA (stay with me here...).
Some years ago I came across the Romanesco Broccoli, sometimes referred to as a broccoflower - the first time I saw I got badly startled, thinking I was experiencing some sort of LSD flashback. But it's real, quite edible (and tasty), and Mrs Browl has since grown several of them in the garden. Check it out here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanesco_broccoli and http://www.fourmilab.ch/images/Romanesco/
There are many other instances of logarithmic spirals in nature, but few so striking as this one, given its compound structure. Irritatingly, I've had little luck finding any serious analysis of this structure - it turns up on quite a few pages, but mostly with a comment of 'yup, that's fractal all right' or mention of it as a teaching aid for introducing mathematical concepts. The only papers mentioning its genome seem concerned with agricultural considerations like yield and disease resistance. I can't understand why it's not the subject of feverish interdisciplinary study, since it practically screams 'analyze me'. Any thoughts from mathematically-inclined HNers?
I think the usual idea is that during development, cell division patterns in the plant apical meristem [1] implement some Lindenmayer system [2]. I don't know if anyone has looked into genetic & molecular mechanisms whereby cell division could be regulated so as to implement an L-system in this way.
Some years ago I came across the Romanesco Broccoli, sometimes referred to as a broccoflower - the first time I saw I got badly startled, thinking I was experiencing some sort of LSD flashback. But it's real, quite edible (and tasty), and Mrs Browl has since grown several of them in the garden. Check it out here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanesco_broccoli and http://www.fourmilab.ch/images/Romanesco/
There are many other instances of logarithmic spirals in nature, but few so striking as this one, given its compound structure. Irritatingly, I've had little luck finding any serious analysis of this structure - it turns up on quite a few pages, but mostly with a comment of 'yup, that's fractal all right' or mention of it as a teaching aid for introducing mathematical concepts. The only papers mentioning its genome seem concerned with agricultural considerations like yield and disease resistance. I can't understand why it's not the subject of feverish interdisciplinary study, since it practically screams 'analyze me'. Any thoughts from mathematically-inclined HNers?