Plants
How Venus flytraps store short-term ‘memories’ of prey
Glowing Venus flytraps reveal how calcium buildup in the cells of leaves acts as a short-term “memory” that helps the plants identify prey.
Plants
More Stories in Plants
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LifeWild bees add about $1.5 billion to yields for just six U.S. crops
Native bees help pollinate blueberries, cherries and other crops on commercial farms.
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PlantsThis parasitic plant consists of just flashy flowers and creepy suckers
With only four known species, Langsdorffia are thieves stripped down to their essentials.
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TechBubble-blowing drones may one day aid artificial pollination
Drones are too clumsy to rub pollen on flowers and not damage them. But blowing pollen-laden bubbles may help the machines be better pollinators.
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LifePollen-deprived bumblebees may speed up plant blooming by biting leaves
In a pollen shortage, some bees nick holes in tomato leaves that accelerate flowering, and pollen production, by weeks.
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ChemistryAncient recipes led scientists to a long-lost natural blue
Led by medieval texts, scientists hunted down a plant and extracted from its tiny fruits a blue watercolor whose origins had long been a mystery.
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ChemistryBeets bleed red but a chemistry tweak can create a blue hue
A new blue dye derived from beet juice might prove an alternative to synthetic blue dyes in foods, cosmetics or fabrics.
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ClimateHow Hurricane Maria’s heavy rains devastated Puerto Rico’s forests
Hurricane Maria wreaked havoc on Puerto Rican forests in some unexpected ways.
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AnimalsA year of big numbers startled the world into talking about nature
One million species are at risk. Three billion birds have been lost. Plus surges in Amazon burning.
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LifeA tree in Brazil’s arid northeast rains nectar from its flowers
Northeast Brazil is home to a tree that entices bat pollinators by making a “sweet rain” of nectar.