My abstract plant was exposed by my sister.

Li Meifen took out her phone, took a picture, and posted it on Xiaohongshu (a Chinese short video platform).

The title is "My son's ADHD seems to have been cured by a cactus."

In her post, she detailed DouDou's situation, her friend's recommendation, and her experiment of removing the cactus.

In conclusion, "I don't know the exact principle behind it, but it really works. Moms with the same problem can give it a try."

When she posted the post, she thought it would only get a dozen or so likes at most. But when she woke up the next morning and opened her phone, she found that her notification bar had exploded.

It received 8,000 likes, 3,000 comments, and 10,000 shares.

In the comments section, one mother said she bought the same cactus for her child and it worked just as well.

Some psychologists also say this may be a kind of "anchoring effect," where the presence of cacti reduces environmental disturbances.

Some even joked, "Are you sure the kid wasn't just doing their homework because they were afraid of a cactus giving them the middle finger?"

Li Meifen's post was screenshotted and posted on Weibo, where it became a trending topic again. The keyword "cactus helps with homework" has garnered over 200 million views.

Xiao Kui was eating when she saw this trending topic. At first glance, she was incredulous, so she looked at the screen again, suddenly stood up, and her chair tipped backward and fell to the ground.

Without even bothering to straighten the chair, she immediately dialed Lin Muyang's number:

"Bro! Did you see the trending topics?!"

Lin Muyang's emotionless voice came from the other end of the phone: "What trending topic?"

"Your cactus! A mom posted online saying it cured her son's ADHD!"

"Impossible. Cacti do not have healing properties."

"See for yourself! I'll send you the link!" Xiao Kui hung up the phone and sent the link.

Not long after, her phone rang.

Xiao Kui answered immediately: "Brother! Did you see that?"

"I saw it." Lin Muyang's voice was still calm, but his speech was twice as fast as usual: "I checked that mother's posting history, and her description of the experiment is logical."

"So it's true?"

"We don't know yet, but it's worth studying."

After hanging up the phone, Xiao Kui started her live stream, and 30,000 people flooded into the live stream room instantly.

Before she could even speak, the comments section was already buzzing with questions:

"I heard the cacti here can cure diseases?"

"I just came from that post."

"Really?"

"I saw that post too!"

Xiao Kui took a screenshot of Li Meifen's post, enlarged it, and showed it to the camera.

"Family members, isn't this the most natural A/B/D concentration aid?"

"ADHD!"

Yes! ADHD!

"My cousin also has ADHD, and the medication has serious side effects, so I immediately recommended it to him."

Xiao Kui then said seriously to the camera, "But! My brother said that there is currently no scientific evidence to prove that cacti can cure ADHD. So please don't blindly follow the trend and wait for further research."

The next morning, Xiao Kui ran to the lab, while Lin Muyang was already busy.

He sat at the control panel, with the middle finger in front of him and a sampler in his hand, collecting air samples around the middle finger.

"What are you doing?" Lin Xiaokui asked curiously.

"Let's see what kind of fart it released."

The middle finger guy immediately gave him the middle finger.

Xiao Kui laughed: "Brother, you've learned to swear?"

"This is scientific terminology."

Is "farting" a scientific term?

The process by which plants release volatile organic compounds is commonly known as farting.

Xiao Kui laughed so hard she squatted on the ground.

He placed a transparent glass dome around the middle finger guy and used a sampler to collect volatile substances in the air for 24 hours, then sent them for gas chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis.

When the results came out, he stared at the graph for ten minutes.

The spectrum showed a very obvious peak, corresponding to a compound he had never seen before. Its molecular weight and structural formula were not those of common plant volatiles.

"What is this thing?" he muttered to himself.

The guy with the middle finger gave him the middle finger.

"Are you farting some new kind of fart?"

The middle finger guy replaced his middle finger with a "V" sign.

Lin Muyang sighed, picked up the phone and called his mentor. Fang Jingshan was watering flowers at home when he answered the phone.

"Teacher Fang, there's something I'd like to tell you."

"explain."

Lin Muyang recounted Dou Dou's story: "I specifically collected volatile substances released by cacti, and the chromatogram showed that it was a completely new compound."

Fang Jingshan fell silent. He put down the spray bottle and sat on the sofa. "So you suspect that the child's ADHD relief is related to this new compound?"

"Yes, but our lab can't verify it right now."

Fang Jingshan paused for a few seconds: "I have a college classmate who is a doctoral supervisor in neuropharmacology. I'll give him a call, and he should be able to verify it."

"Thank you, Teacher Fang."

"No need to thank me. Send me the data first."

Lin Muyang hung up the phone and sent Fang Jingshan a package containing the chromatograms, mass spectra, and experimental records.

Then he leaned back in his chair, staring blankly at the ceiling, when the big orange cat jumped onto his lap and rubbed against his hand.

"Big Orange, do you think I've discovered something amazing?"

The big orange cat meowed, jumped down, walked to the cactus, and swept the flowerpot with its tail.

The cactus gave the cat the middle finger.

Three days later, Fang Jingshan arrived at the laboratory with a person.

The man was in his fifties, with gray hair, wearing silver-rimmed glasses and a dark blue jacket. When he entered the lab, he didn't look at the cacti, but instead glanced around first.

"The environment is nice," he said.

"Old He, stop looking at this, look at this." Fang Jingshan pulled him to the control panel and pointed to the stack of data.

He Songnian picked up the chromatogram, looked at it for a few minutes, and then put it down. He then picked up the mass spectrum and looked at it for about ten seconds.

"Molecular weight 347. The structure contains an indole ring and a long-chain fatty acid residue. It's somewhat similar to the structure of endogenous macromolecular molecules." He adjusted his glasses: "Did you conduct animal experiments?"

"No," Lin Muyang said, "I can't."

"Fang Jingshan, you are a very honest student." He Songnian glanced at Fang Jingshan, then turned to Lin Muyang: "I'll help you with the experiment, but I have one condition."

"What are the conditions?"

"If it really works, my name should be included in future papers."

Lin Muyang glanced at Fang Jingshan, who nodded.

"Okay," Lin Muyang said.

He Songnian took an insulated box out of his briefcase and opened it. Inside were several small cages, each containing a white mouse.

"I'll first conduct an open-field experiment using your volatiles," he said, putting on his gloves.

"The open field test is to observe the activity level of mice. In the ADHD model mice, they will run around in the open field and cannot stop."

If the volatiles are effective, they will settle down.

Lin Muyang helped him collect the volatiles from the glass dome into the syringe, and then injected them into the nebulizer.

He Songnian placed the nebulizer in the corner of a mouse cage and turned it on.

The little white mouse was frantically circling and climbing the walls in its cage, occasionally digging up the bedding.

But after the atomizer started working, it paused for a moment, then stopped, and then walked to the atomizer, lay down and squinted its eyes.

Fang Jingshan leaned closer to the cage and glanced at it: "Is it sleeping?"

"It's not sleeping, it's relaxing." He Songnian's voice was a little tense: "Look closely, its whiskers are no longer twitching rapidly, and its tail is down. This is a typical sign of anxiety relief."

He then conducted three control experiments, and all the mice calmed down.

He Songnian took off his glasses, wiped the lenses, and put them back on.

"Fang Jingshan, you've struck gold with this student."

Fang Jingshan didn't speak. He looked at the quiet little white mouse in the cage with a complicated expression.

"Old He, are you sure?"

"Confirmed." He Songnian pointed to the chromatogram: "I've never seen this compound before. If it can cross the blood-brain barrier and act on the central nervous system, then its significance..." He paused, "is more than just ADHD."

"What else?"

"Autism spectrum. I have a research project that involves creating a high-functioning animal model of autism; I'll give it a try when I get back."

Fang Jingshan nodded.

When He Songnian left, he took three sampling tubes with him. He walked to the door and glanced back at the cactus on the windowsill. The cactus gave him the middle finger.

"The plant you're raising, student, has a rather difficult temperament."

"It treats me the same way." Fang Jingshan said expressionlessly.