The Week in Botany - April 5 2021
A second round of daffodils has joined the long-lasting Tête-à-tête daffodils in the front lawn. It now looks like there's a bolt of sunlight across the grass, particularly when the actual sunlight comes out. Even though we had a frost last night, the longer hours of daylight are a welcome reminder that planting season is coming soon.
I've taken days either side of the weekend off. To do that I've been working on automating the site for things to come out while I'm away. That's why most of the botany I've seen this week has been the stories highlighted by people following @BotanyOne on Twitter. There's been a lot of talk about the early cherry blossom, and also on the sale of peat at garden centres.
I'll be back working mid-week, but sadly (for us) Erin Zimmerman won't. She has left Botany One for a new challenge. We all wish her the best, and we'll miss her. There is a small backlog of her work to publish, so you will see her name on a post or two when the newsletter returns next week.
Until then, take care,
Alun (webmaster@botany.one)
Monday
"For those of you teaching about conifers, we've made 3D images of the cones of some common species that can be rotated, zoomed in on, etc." @SallyNAitken
Dynamics of the cell fate specifications during female gametophyte development in Arabidopsis
Susaki et al. visualized the living dynamics of female gametophyte development and performed transcriptome analysis of individual cell types to assess the cell fate specifications in Arabidopsis thaliana. They recorded time lapses of the nuclear dynamics and cell plate formation from the 1-nucleate stage to the 7-cell stage after cellularization using an in vitro ovule culture system. The movies showed that the nuclear division occurred along the micropylar–chalazal (distal–proximal) axis.
Global Conservation Consortium for Erica The Global Conservation Consortium for Erica brings together the world’s Erica experts, conservationists, and the botanic garden community to ensure that no wild species of Erica becomes extinct
Understanding the timing sequence of maize leaf development — www.botany.one Detailed information on the dynamics of leaf production and extension along a maize (Zea mays) shoot can improve crop model predictions.
Tuesday
Implications of size-dependent tree mortality for tropical forest carbon dynamics
Gora and Esquivel-Muelbert propose a cohesive and empirically informed framework for understanding and investigating size-dependent drivers of tree mortality. This theory-based framework enables them to posit that abiotic drivers of tree mortality—particularly drought, wind and lightning—regulate tropical forest carbon cycling via their disproportionate effects on large trees.
Albugo candida is an obligate oomycete pathogen that infects many plants in the Brassicaceae family. Furzer et al. re-sequenced the genome of isolate Ac2V using PacBio long reads and constructed an assembly augmented by Illumina reads. The Ac2VPB genome assembly is 10% larger and more contiguous compared to a previous version.
Rare pictures of Rare-Earth Elements in live hyper-accumulating fern roots and shoots: silicon might play a role in detoxification — www.botany.one
New X-raying method reveals how a fern accumulates rare-earth elements in its tissues.
Japan's cherry blossom 'earliest peak since 812' The cherry blossom season, Japan's traditional sign of spring, has peaked at the earliest date since records began 1,200 years ago, research shows.
Wednesday
Ph.D. botanist inspired to start African American scientists series Last summer was emotional for many people throughout the country. Movements like Black Lives Matter led many to reflect of the role race plays in society, and to act. Scientists like Shawn Abrahams used that as inspiration to look more closely at what career options are available for botanists, paleobotanists, and plant scientists outside of research. Abrahams felt compelled to capitalize on that energy and inspire fellow minorities.
Fertilized egg cells secrete endopeptidases to avoid polytubey
How plant egg cells regulate the rejection of extra tubes after successful fertilization is not known. Yu et al. report that the aspartic endopeptidases ECS1 and ECS2 are secreted to the extracellular space from a cortical network located at the apical domain of the Arabidopsis egg cell. This reaction is triggered only after successful fertilization.
Advancing flowering is altering the dates of some cultural events — www.botany.one Concern that flowers are blooming earlier is about more than wish to return to the good old days.
Colley and Vallejo-Marín provide a list of buzz-pollinated food crops and discuss the extent to which they rely on pollination by vibration-producing bees. They then use the most commonly cultivated of these crops, the tomato, Solanum lycopersicum L. (Solanales: Solanaceae), as a case study to investigate the effect of different pollination treatments on aspects of fruit quality.
Thursday
Three new methods indicate that rising carbon dioxide reduces seedling respiration — www.botany.one Can new careful methods help us understand how plant respiration will be affected by rising carbon dioxide concentrations?
Fossil data do not support a long pre-Cretaceous history of flowering plants
Silvestro et al. use a novel methodology to model past angiosperm diversity based on a Bayesian Brownian Bridge model of fossil finds assigned to extant families, concluding that a Cretaceous origin is vanishingly unlikely. However, their results strongly conflict with the known temporal distribution of angiosperm fossils. While Budd et al. agree that statistical analysis aids interpretation of the fossil record, they argue the conclusions of Silvestro et al. are unsound.
Toxic impact of pesticides on bees has doubled, study shows
Analysis contradicts claims that the environmental impact of pesticides is falling, say scientists.
University of Cologne Join our team and work with us on the evolution of gene regulation and polygenic adaptation in plants.
Friday
Extinction at the end-Cretaceous and the origin of modern Neotropical rainforests
The origin of modern rainforests can be traced to the aftermath of the bolide impact at the end of the Cretaceous. Carvalho et al. used fossilized pollen and leaves to characterize the changes that took place in northern South American forests at this time.
Condensed tannin distribution in fine roots linked to mycorrhizal type — www.botany.one Both tannin distribution and root anatomy showed distinct patterns depending on mycorrhiza type.
Trends in ecology and conservation over eight decades -
Anderson et al. provide what we believe is the largest full‐text culturomic analysis of ecology and conservation journals, covering 80 years, 52 journals, and half a billion words. Our analysis illuminates the boom‐and‐bust of ecological hypotheses and theories; the adoption of statistical, genetic, and social‐science approaches; and the domination of terms that have emerged in recent decades (eg climate change, invasive species, ecosystem services, meta‐analysis, and supplementary material, which largely replaced unpublished data).
Garden centres 'failing to stop peat sales' Leading garden retailers are still failing to stop the sale of peat in compost despite pressure from the government and campaigners.
Weekend
In celebration of plants — www.botany.one
"Having read a lot of books from a plants-and-people perspective lately, I’d forgotten the sheer joy of reading about plants for their own sake as awesome products of nature. That pleasure was brought back to me by In Defense of Plants by Matt Candeias."
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