cuticle reduction

[Andrew Smith]

A group of students, myself included, are involved in a BLIP project. 
(Botany Laboratory Inquiry Project)  We are studying the effects of touch on 
soy bean plants.  One of our test groups receives a gentle 'rub down' for 
two minutes per day.  Our control group recieves no touch.  After about a 
week of this treatment the leaves began to curl and look frazzled along the 
margins.  The control group shows none of the above signs.  My fingers feel 
slick after I touch the plants, so I am assuming that my fingers are 
picking up some of the cuticle.  Are my fingers reducing the amount of the 
cuticle on the leaves so they are loosing moisture, thus the curling and 
frazzled appearance, or could I possibly be depositing substances on the 
leaves that cause the effects?  (i.e. salts)
      
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          ...If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its   
          author and finisher.  As a nation of freemen, we must    
          live through all time, or die by suicide.                
                                            -Abraham Lincoln       
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                Andrew D. Smith   s1091865 at cedarville.edu                                                                  !