Some thoughts on silicon and carbon trade-offs in plants

In 1983, Raven suggested that silica could substitute for lignin or cellulose as a structural material in plants, and should be favoured because of its lower energetic costs. He then asked the question why more plants did not use silica for structural support. Raven’s idea eventually led to a whole series of investigations into the substitution of silicon for carbon in plants, so-called trade-offs. In this Opinion we offer some, hopefully helpful, thoughts on this research, and we attempt to answer Raven’s question. We conclude that more focus on the distribution of silicon and carbon at the cellular level is needed, and that we should be more careful to avoid teleological thinking.