“Glowing” plants may predict flash droughts by emitting solar-induced fluorescence (SIF), detected by NASA satellites. Increased plant productivity before a drought reduces soil moisture, indicating risk. These early signals, visible from space, could provide up to three months’ warning, aiding mitigation efforts and improving agricultural planning.
Understanding how fire influences plant life is crucial for safeguarding biodiversity. By predicting plant responses to fire, scientists aid conservation efforts. Through traits like resprouting and seed germination, plants adapt to fire-prone ecosystems. With accurate predictions, land managers can plan controlled burns effectively, crucial as fire patterns evolve. Advancing fire-plant knowledge is key to future protection.
With land clearance, bushfires, weeds and climate change, small pockets of native vegetation are important for future plant and animal conservation – but do plants in small reserves struggle with reduced habitat for both plants and their pollinators?
A four-year field experiment conducted on the shores of restored Lake Mustijärv in Viljandi, Estonia, has revealed that recycling phosphorus-rich lake sediments back to agriculture could have positive impacts on crop production.
Researchers have developed the first-ever microneedle-based drug delivery technique for plants. The method can be used to precisely deliver controlled amounts of agrochemicals to specific plant tissues for research purposes. When applied in the field, it could be used in precision agriculture to improve crop quality and disease management.
New research finds almost 4000 Australian plant species have not been photographed before in the wild, which may lead to their extinction.
The tropics hold most of the planet’s biodiversity. In order to preserve this fragile and valuable asset, many individuals and communities need to get involved and be well informed. However, tropical ecology and conservation sciences are still often affected by colonialistic and discriminatory practices, which can hamper nature conservation success. An international research team from leading universities in tropical research has now proposed how researchers from the Global South, which consists of nations historically damaged by colonialism, could better promote solutions for a sustainable development.
Using commercial, high-resolution satellite images and artificial intelligence, an international team mapped almost 10 billion individual trees in Africa’s drylands to assess the amount of carbon stored outside of the continent’s dense tropical forests. The result is the first comprehensive estimate of tree carbon density in the Saharan, Sahel, and Sudanian zones of Africa. The data are free and publicly available.
We need to rethink how we think about Indigenous crops, say plant biologists. These crops include groundnut, teff grass, and a wide range of cereals, grains, fruits, legumes, and root vegetables predominantly cultivated by small farms in Africa, Asia, and South America.
A big part of evolution is competition– when there are limited resources to go around, plants and animals have to duke it out for nutrients, mates, and places to live. That means that the flower-covered meadows of China’s Hengduan mountains were an evolutionary mystery– there are dozens of species of closely-related rhododendrons that all live in harmony. To figure out why, scientists spent a summer carefully documenting the flowering patterns of 34 Rhododendron species, and they discovered the reason why the plants were able to coexist: they burst into bloom at different points in the season so they don’t have to compete for pollinators.
