Now a global study has found mosses are not just good for the garden, but are just as vital for the health of the entire planet when they grow on topsoil. Not only do they lay the foundations for plants to flourish in ecosystems around the world, they may play an important role mitigating against climate change by capturing vast amounts of carbon.
Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are toxic compounds generated by living systems through aerobic respiration and photosynthesis. Now, researchers have studied the mechanism to regulate the activity of ROS-producing enzymes and revealed that ROS is involved in the growth of spruce and synthesis of lignin, a key cell wall component. The findings could help develop technologies for producing valuable timber-based materials and boost the growth of coniferous trees.
Researchers got into the forests on the island of Dominica after 9 months of the Category 5 Hurricane Maria and examined the trees closely. They discovered that while 89% of the trees sustained damage — 76% of which had major damage —only 10% were immediately killed. Many of the trees had resprouted.
Did humans favor certain wild plants for domestication because they were more easily “tamed”? New research calls for a reappraisal of the process of plant domestication, based on almost a decade of observations and experiments. The behavior of erect knotweed, a buckwheat relative, has paleoethnobotanists completely reassessing our understanding of plant domestication.
Tobacco plants have been engineered to manufacture an alluring perfume of insect sex pheromones, which could be used to confuse would-be pests looking for love and reduce the need for pesticides.
Insights into gene and protein control systems that regulate the use of nitrogen by plant roots could help develop crops that require less nitrogenous fertilizers to produce acceptable yields.
Aging is a part of life, and plants are no exception. The life cycle of a plant is felt in genebanks that store plant materials, such as seeds. Plant materials in genebanks may be accessed by farmers, researchers, conservationists, and others for breeding. But for a genebank to provide useful germplasm to growers, the seeds stored there must be alive when harvested. And as the stored seeds start to age, fewer and fewer of them live long enough to germinate. So, genebanks must continuously monitor stored seeds to ensure they haven’t aged beyond their ‘expiration date’ and lose ability to germinate.
The study reveals a relatively stable sugar-starch partitioning pattern in mountain trees across the world, which predominately modulates the balance of carbon assimilates between supply and demand. It provides implications for understanding how trees respond to climate change in terms of carbon ecophysiology.
On bright chilly mornings you can either snuggle down under the duvet or leap up and seize the day. However, for photosynthesising plants, this kind of dawn spells danger, so they have evolved their own way of making cold mornings tolerable.
A new digital tool can help farmers plan weed control with reduced pesticide use.
