PLANT LIFE is an intimate and urgent portrait of Dr. Joanne Chory, a scientist who rewrote the rules of plant biology and is now racing to enlist those breakthroughs to fight climate change. In the 1980s, Chory pursued a question bordering on scientific heresy: what if plants didn't need light to grow? By inducing genetic mutations and planting seeds in total darkness, she uncovered something that should not have existed — vigorous seedlings thriving without sunlight. This surprising result demonstrated that plants could be genetically reprogrammed, and helped transform plant biology from a quiet corner of life science into a frontier of discovery.

Then, she was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. As her physical capacity slowed, she watched the climate crisis accelerate: atmospheric carbon levels were climbing at an unprecedented rate. Chory turned her life's work toward the planet's most urgent crisis. Instead of building vast new carbon-capture machines, what if we optimized the ones already covering half the Earth's surface? Her team set out to re-engineer crop plants with deeper, carbon-rich roots capable of locking away CO₂ for centuries. At once a deeply human portrait and a scientific race against time, PLANT LIFE follows a woman who has spent her life decoding how plants survive — and now believes that knowledge may be essential to our own survival.