Search Content
-
News
Rising CO2 levels might not be as good for plants as we thought
Two major groups of plants have shown a surprising reversal of fortunes in the face of rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
During a 20-year field experiment in Minnesota, a widespread group of plants that initially grew faster when fed more CO2 stopped doing so after 12 years, researchers report in the April 20 Science. Meanwhile, the extra CO2 began to stimulate the...
-
Editor's Note
Why it’s great to have a geologist in the house
Science has a way of surprising us when we least expect it. Like with mud rocks.03/22/2018 - 10:19 Science & Society, Earth, PlantsWe science journalists can be a cranky lot, eternally skeptical as to whether a touted advance is really significant enough to warrant coverage. So when Science News’ managing editor Erin Wayman waxed enthusiastic about a study explaining how ancient plants may have played a key role in making Earth...
-
News in Brief
Liverwort reproductive organ inspires pipette design
The sex organs of primitive plants are inspiring precise pipettes.
Liverworts are a group of ground-hugging plants with male and female reproductive structures shaped like tiny palm trees. The female structures nab sperm-packed water droplets by surrounding them with their fronds, like an immobilized claw in an arcade machine.
Scientists have coopted that design to create a plastic...
-
News in Brief
These petunias launch seeds that spin 1,660 times a second
Nature may have a few things to teach tennis players about backspin.
The hairyflower wild petunia (Ruellia ciliatiflora) shoots seeds that spin up to 1,660 times per second, which helps them fly farther, researchers report March 7 in Journal of the Royal Society Interface. These seeds have the fastest known rotations of any plant or animal, the authors say. Plants that disperse seeds a...
-
News
Pollution regulations help Chesapeake Bay seagrass rebound
Underwater grasses are growing back in the Chesapeake Bay. The plants now carpet three times as much real estate as in 1984, thanks to more than 30 years of efforts to reduce nitrogen pollution. This environmental success story shows that regulations put in place to protect the bay’s health have made a difference, researchers report the week of March 5 in Proceedings of the National Academy of...
-
News
Early land plants led to the rise of mud
Early plants made Earth muddier. Ancient riverbed deposits of mud rock — rocks containing bits of clay and silt smaller than grains of sand — began increasing around 458 million years ago, around the time that rootless plants became common across Earth, researchers say.
Anecdotally, geologists have long noted that early sediment deposits became muddier at some point, and suggested a...
-
It's Alive
The flowers that give us chocolate are ridiculously hard to pollinate
It’s a wonder we have chocolate at all. Talk about persnickety, difficult flowers.
Arguably some of the most important seeds on the planet — they give us candy bars and hot cocoa, after all — come from pods created by dime-sized flowers on cacao trees. Yet those flowers make pollination just barely possible.
Growers of commercial fruit crops expect 50 to 60 percent of flowers to...
-
News in Brief
Ancient ozone holes may have sterilized forests 252 million years ago
Volcano-fueled holes in Earth’s ozone layer 252 million years ago may have repeatedly sterilized large swaths of forest, setting the stage for the world’s largest mass extinction event. Such holes would have allowed ultraviolet-B radiation to blast the planet. Even radiation levels below those predicted for the end of the Permian period damage trees’ abilities to make seeds, researchers report...
-
Wild Things
Pollinators are usually safe from a Venus flytrap
Out of the hundreds of species of carnivorous plants found across the planet, none attract quite as much fascination as the Venus flytrap. The plants are native to just a small section of North Carolina and South Carolina, but these tiny plants can now be found around the world. They’re a favorite among gardeners, who grow them in homes and greenhouses.
Scientists, too, have long been...
-
Year in Review
2017 delivered amazing biology finds from organisms large and small
2017 revealed some surprising biology of organisms large and small, from quick-dozing elephants to sex-changing lizards and carbon-dumping sea creatures.
Switch it upToasty temperatures trump genetics when it comes to the sex of a bearded dragon lizard. Now researchers have found how RNA editing helps turn overheated male embryos into females (SN Online: 6/14/17).
Homegrown...