Plants

Plants

Smokey the Gardener

Wildfire smoke by itself, without help from heat, can trigger germination in certain seeds, but just what the vital compound in that smoke might be has kept biologists busy for years.

Plants

Lowering lilies on the tree of life

Water lilies may belong on the lowest branch of the family tree of flowering plants, along with a shrub called Amborella.

Plants

Rewriting the Nitrogen Story: Plant cycles nutrient forward and backward

For the first time, a green plant has been found to break down nitrogen-containing compounds into the readily usable form of nitrates, a job usually done by microbes.

Plants

Wind Highways: Mosses, lichens travel along aerial paths

Invisible freeways of wind may account for the similarity of plant species on islands that lie thousands of kilometers apart.

Plants

A Frond Fared Well: Genes hint that ferns proliferated in shade of flowering plants

Analyses of genetic material from a multitude of fern species suggest that much of that plant group branched out millions of years after flowering plants first appeared, a notion that contradicts many scientists' views of plant evolution.

Plants

Sudden oak death jumps quarantine

The funguslike microbe that causes sudden oak death has turned up on nursery plants in southern California for the first time.

Plants

Dawn of the Y: Papaya—Glimpse of early sex chromosome

Genetic mappers say that the papaya plant has a rudimentary Y chromosome, the youngest one in evolutionary terms yet found, offering a glimpse of the evolution of sex chromosomes.

Plants

Sweet Lurkers: Cryptic fungi protect chocolate-tree leaves

A whole world of fungi thrives inside tree leaves without causing any harm, and researchers now say these residents may help fight disease.

Plants

Warm-Blooded Plants?

Research heats up on why some flowers have the chemistry to keep themselves warm.

Plants

Micro Sculptors

Snippets of RNA that control biochemical reactions by squelching the creation of specific proteins play a role in the development of leaves.

Plants

Bean plants punish microbial partners

In a novel test of how partnerships between species can last in nature, researchers have found that soybeans punish cheaters.

Plants

Glitch splits hermaphrodite flowers

In a newly proposed scenario, polyploidy may trigger perfectly good hermaphrodite plants to evolve gender forms.