Where the pine species grows is always tilted to one side

Cook pine trees all over the world have stems that are always tilted towards the equator.

Scientists at the California Polytechnic University, USA, discovered Cook pine trees , the scientific name Araucaria columnaris , always leaning toward the equator despite living on any continent in the world, according to Science Alert. . The results of the study are published in the journal Ecology on May 30.

Cook Pine, named after British explorer James Cook, originated in New Caledonia, a tropical archipelago in the Pacific southwest. Currently, Cook pine is grown popularly in parks and gardens in many parts of the world. They can be as high as 60m, the branches are short so the foliage is not too wide.

The trunk of the Cook pine was always tilted, towards the equator.(Photo: Ecology).

Matt Ritter, lead author of the study, found that all Cook pine in California and Hawaii, USA, seemed to be tilted south. Meanwhile, Cook pine trees that grow in southern hemisphere countries like Australia are leaning north.

Ritter and colleagues measured the height, diameter of the trunk, as well as the inclination of 256 Cook pine trees growing in 18 different lands on 5 continents. They exclude trees affected by external forces during growth from objects such as buildings or electric poles.

"We found a surprising thing, that the Cook pine is capable of depending on the hemisphere that it lives, " the team said.

The results showed that the Cook pine living in the Northern hemisphere was tilted south an average angle of 8.05 degrees. In the southern hemisphere, the opposite is true, the tree is tilted to the north. The latitude also makes a difference, the more trees grow out of the equator, the greater the inclination.

The exact cause of the phenomenon so far has not been explained. Scientists believe that gravity, magnetic fields, the angle of sunlight to Earth may play a role, causing the incline of Cook's trunk to tilt.