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Image credit: Frontiers in Environmental Science

Forestry Global Change News Plant Science

Tree rings track atmospheric mercury cheaply

Wild fig tree rings offer a cheap method for tracking toxic atmospheric mercury, a byproduct of gold mining in the Global South, according to a study conducted in the Peruvian Amazon

Isabel12/05/2025

News Plant Health

Climate change and globalization raise risks from crop pests

Climate change and globalization are driving a surge in threats to crops from insects and mites, researchers say. Rising temperatures are enabling pests to move further from the equator and to higher ground, while increased trade is accelerating the spread…

Isabel07/05/2025

News Plant Science

Food and fuel that farms itself: Genome sequences of duckweed species reveal basis for unique plant traits

Under the right conditions, duckweed essentially farms itself. Wastewater, ponds, puddles, swamps—you name it. If there’s enough sunlight and carbon dioxide, the aquatic plant can grow freely. But that’s not all that makes it intriguing. Packed inside duckweed’s tiny fronds…

Isabel02/05/2025

Image: UCR student Annalise Kane, co-first author of the study. Credit: Claudia Sepulveda/UCR

News Plant Science

Triggering parasitic plant ‘suicide’ to help farmers

Parasitic weeds devastate crops in food-insecure regions by hijacking plant signals. Scientists have found a way to trick these weeds into germinating when no host is present, causing them to die. Using engineered microbes, they’re producing key plant hormones to…

Isabel22/04/2025

Image: The chocolate tree age. Credit: Daniel Tineo, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

Agriculture News

Mapping maternal lineages of fine aroma cocoa through chloroplast DNA

A genomic analysis of fine aroma cocoa from northern Peru revealed genetic divergence and evolutionary patterns within Theobroma cacao. The study identified 3 distinct genetic groups and estimated divergence times, suggesting that fine aroma cocoa diversified during the Pleistocene. The…

Isabel17/04/2025

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Tree rings track atmospheric mercury cheaply

Climate change and globalization raise risks from crop pests

Food and fuel that farms itself: Genome sequences of duckweed species reveal basis for unique plant traits

Triggering parasitic plant ‘suicide’ to help farmers

Mapping maternal lineages of fine aroma cocoa through chloroplast DNA

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