The Week in Botany
The Week in Botany 21
We send out a weekly email on Monday mornings. Here’s the one we sent Monday, October 30, 2017.
Reviews
The Plant Messiah by Carlos Magdalena
If you’re looking to explain to someone how botany can be exciting, then The Plant Messiah by Carlos Magdalena is an excellent place to start.
Uncategorized
How do you grow a palm? The secret’s in the soil.
An investigation on a tiny island reveals that microscopic fungi can dictate the destiny of giants, opening the possibility of mycorrhizal-driven speciation.
annals-of-botany
Not For Your Eyes: Ultraviolet Patterns in Sunflowers
When you look at a sunflower you see gold. When an insect looks at a sunflower it sees something quite different.
Reviews
Brilliant Green by Stefano Mancuso and Alessandra Viola
Do plants possess intelligence? If you’re looking for a challenging book for your non-botanist friends, then Mancuso and Viola have something to interest you.
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Sexual Magnetism as an Infection – How Red Dwarf Got Close to the Truth
When the crew from Red Dwarf discovered positive viruses at a Space Corps base, they got surprisingly close to reality.
annals-of-botany
This plant sucks! (But how?)
The bladderwort has a trap faster than the blink of an eye. It uses powerful suction to snatch its prey but how can a plant can suck so much?
Ecosystems
How diverse do you need biodiversity to be?
Intensification of agriculture has led to a decline in pollinators. One reason is the loss of key species to support bees and flies, but how diverse a mix of plants to you need to support an ecosystem?
Close Encounters
Persecuted fruit bat may be key to Durian’s survival in Asia
The fruit bat has been persecuted due to the belief it destroyed crops of Durian. Now critically endangered, it seems that it is a key pollinator for the fruit tree.
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Not all tropical plants can stand the heat brought by climate change
How will increasing temperatures affect plants where temperatures are hottest? A paper in the Journal of Ecology looks at plants around Kilimanjaro.
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Predictive modelling for yield – bringing genotype and phenotype together
Yesterday was our final day at Bioenergy Genomics 2017. There’s quite a bit of video to sort through and process, so I’ll be busy
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Genetic and genomic approaches to biomass crop improvement
We’re still at Bioenergy Genomics 2017, streaming talks when we can. We’ll be processing these to go on to YouTube. In the meantime you