🌻 The Week in Botany May 20, 2024
Often there’ll be weeks when I’ve been busy and feel I have nothing to show for it. This week is different. There are six interviews on Botany One, so the site has been busy, but all the work for this was handled by Carlos Ordóñez-Parra. I’ve enjoyed reading them.
This week we’ll have an article by Victor H. D. Silva on how fire affects pollination. I expected that it would stop it pronto, but it turns out it’s a bit more complicated than that.
Also, there’ll be an email of what's getting shared on Mastodon, Bluesky, Twitter and LinkedIn at the same time next week. Until then, take care.
Alun (webmaster@botany.one)
In Botany One
Kelsey Byers: “See the world through the plant’s perspective!”
Hervé Sauquet: Never Looking at Flowers the Same Way
Daniela Boanares: “We Need to Understand Plants if We Want to Thrive on this Planet”
Charlotte Taylor: “Looking at Plants is Never Boring and Endlessly Fascinating”
Dechang Cao: The Seeds of Fascination
Idowu Obisesan: Nurturing a Passion for Plants
In AoBC Journals
News & Views
'Tiny forests' planted to make woods for communities
Two "tiny forests" have been planted to provide woodland for communities and wildlife to enjoy. The forests are in Bensham and Birtley in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, and are each about the size of a tennis court.
See also: Instead of a Single Tree, Plant a ‘Pocket Forest’
When Did Flowering Plants Evolve? Huge Study Shakes Up Their Tree Of Life
The most detailed tree of life for flowering plants yet offers unrivaled insight into their evolutionary history.
Review: Botanist Solidify Love of Plants with New Release Paleobotany
‘Green metal’ outfit Botanist and its singular mastermind Otrebor is back with a new slate of avant-garde metal titled Paleobotany, and the latest in its ongoing series of love and dedication to plants is as experimental, heavy, and focused on nature as one would hope.
Sticky oil sprayed onto plants offers alternative to pesticides
A sticky liquid made from vegetable oil could be sprayed onto plants to catch small pests such as thrips without affecting larger insects such as bees.
The Next Full Moon is the Flower, Corn, or Corn Planting Moon
An old English name for this Moon is the Milk Moon. In 703 AD the English monk St. Bede the Venerable wrote that what we now call May was the "Three-Milkings Month," apparently because this was the month when cows could be milked three times a day.
Study reveals history and oceanic voyages of remarkable baobab tree
The origins and history of the baobab - found in Madagascar and parts of Africa and Australia - have been something of a mystery. A new study resolves this, based on genomic analyses of all eight recognized species as well as ecological and geological data, so the baobab's story can finally be told.
When You're Grieving, Garden
Getting your hands dirty can balance body and heart, and honor your loved one.
Botanists are scouring the US-Mexico border to document a forgotten ecosystem split by a giant wall
Botanists and citizen scientists armed with the iNaturalist app on their smartphones are recording the biodiversity along the U.S.-Mexico border.
‘Embrace the bog’: Chelsea flower show expert champions flood-proof garden
As the prestige flower event begins, horticulturalists are shown how a waterlogged patch can help counter climate crisis
Scientific Papers
Macroevolution of the plant–hummingbird pollination system (OA)
Barreto et al. synthesize prior studies, illustrating the origins and dynamics of hummingbird pollination across different angiosperm clades previously pollinated by insects (mostly bees), bats, and passerine birds.
The temperature sensor TWA1 is required for thermotolerance in Arabidopsis (OA)
Bohn et al. show that TWA1 is a temperature-sensing transcriptional co-regulator that is needed for basal and acquired thermotolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana. At elevated temperatures, TWA1 changes its conformation and allows physical interaction with JASMONATE-ASSOCIATED MYC-LIKE (JAM) transcription factors and TOPLESS (TPL) and TOPLESS-RELATED (TPR) proteins for repressor complex assembly.
Molecular insights and impacts of wildfire-induced soil chemical changes ($)
In this Review, Lopez et al. outline the molecular-scale transformations and biogeochemical interactions of soil organic matter and metals induced by wildfires and explore their impacts on post-fire human health and ecosystem recovery.
ReadCube: https://rdcu.be/dIn8E
Widespread horizontal gene transfer between plants and bacteria (OA)
Haimlich et al hypothesized that the spatial vicinity and the long-term relationships between plants and their microbiota may promote cross-kingdom horizontal gene transfer (HGT), a phenomenon that is relatively rare in nature. To test this hypothesis they analyzed the Arabidopsis thaliana genome and its extensively sequenced microbiome to detect events of horizontal transfer of full length genes that transferred between plants and bacteria.
The stomatal response to vapor pressure deficit drives the apparent temperature response of photosynthesis in tropical forests ($)
To explore the independent effects of temperature and vapor pressure deficit on photosynthesis Slot et al. analyzed photosynthesis data from the upper canopies of two tropical forests in Panama with Generalized Additive Models.
The AMSlide for noninvasive time-lapse imaging of arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis (OA)
McGaley et al. introduce the AMSlide: a noninvasive, high-resolution, live-imaging system optimised for arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis research. They demonstrate the AMSlide's applications in confocal microscopy of mycorrhizal roots, from whole colonisation zones to subcellular structures, over timeframes from minutes to weeks.
Efficient scar-free knock-ins of several kilobases in plants by engineered CRISPR-Cas endonucleases (OA)
Schreiber et al. identified two groups of exonucleases from the herpes virus and the bacteriophage T7 families that conferred an up to 38-fold increase in homology-directed repair frequencies when fused to Cas9/Cas12a in a tobacco mosaic virus-based transient assay in Nicotiana benthamiana. They achieved precise and scar-free insertion of several kilobases of DNA both in transient and stable transformation systems. In Arabidopsis thaliana, fusion of Cas9 to a herpes virus family exonuclease led to 10-fold higher frequencies of knock-ins in the first generation of transformants.
Plasmodesmal closure elicits stress responses (OA)
Plant cells are connected to their neighbors via plasmodesmata facilitating the exchange of nutrients, hormones, and signaling molecules. While immune elicitors trigger changes in plasmodesmal aperture, it is unknown how this contributes towards a full immune response. To investigate this, Tee et al. developed two transgenic lines with which we could induce plasmodesmal closure independently of immune elicitors.
Transcription factors HB21/40/53 trigger inflorescence arrest through abscisic acid accumulation at the end of flowering (OA)
Sánchez-Gerschon et al. characterized the role of HB21 in the control of the inflorescence arrest at the end of flowering in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana). HB21, together with HB40 and HB53, are upregulated in the inflorescence apex at the end of flowering, promoting floral bud arrest.
Careers
Postdoctoral Associate in Plant Hydrodynamics (m/f/d), Hohenheim
The newly established Department of Plant Ecophysiology at the University of Hohenheim seeks a colleague for a full-time, 3-year position to begin in September 2024. The successful candidate will pursue fundamental research (90%) in plant hydrodynamics in collaboration with Jun. Prof. Martin Bouda and perform teaching duties (10%) for the department.
Multiple positions as Lecturer / Senior Lecturer in Biological Sciences, Melbourne
The School of Biological Sciences is hiring three (3) positions across:
* Lecturer or Senior Lecturer in Global Change Biology
* Lecturer or Senior Lecturer in Plant Community Ecology
* Lecturer or Senior Lecturer in Botany or Phycology
Herbarium Collections Manager, Tennessee
The TENN herbarium is seeking a highly organized, detail-oriented individual to join our department as the Herbarium Collections Manager. This key team member oversees the day-to-day management, preservation, and accessibility of our plant and fungal biodiversity collection, which includes specimen curation, record keeping, and monitoring specimen inflow/outflow. In addition, the Herbarium Collections Manager leads a team of undergraduate students and volunteer assistants with specimen curation and scientific outreach projects.
Adjunct Instructor – Botany, Illinois
Olive-Harvey College is currently seeking an Adjunct Instructor to teach Botany. If you have passion for teaching and learning, and are committed to the mission of the community college, consider joining our team.
Lecturer/Senior Lecturer (Metabolic Engineering, Bioenergetics or Plant Biochemistry), London
The appointee will conduct research, teach and mentor students at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels in the subjects of: Metabolic Engineering, Bioenergetics or Plant Biochemistry. Applications may address more than one priority area, and multi-disciplinary approaches are particularly welcome.
Research Associate, Sheffield
We are looking for a post-doctoral researcher to join the Healthy Soil, Healthy Food, Healthy People (H3) project that seeks to deliver a step-change in UK food production, addressing questions concerning what we should eat and how can we produce food in a sustainable manner. In this post you will explore how synthetic growth substrates and microbial communities can be deployed in hydroponic systems to improve plant growth and nutrition, whilst providing resistance to pests and pathogens.
Research Technician, Bristol
You will use a variety of standard experimental techniques to make fundamental insights into plant development. These techniques include DNA/RNA extraction, amplification and quantification; molecular cloning, production of transgenic plants, histological examination, protein and chromatin assays and sequencing library preparation. In addition to carrying out the techniques themselves you will help to train other members of the research group as necessary.
Cereal Pathologist, Cambridge
We are recruiting a Cereal Pathologist to join our friendly and dynamic field pathology team to provide a practical senior scientific (specialist) support in the area of plant pathology, with the main focus on fungal rust and mildew diseases of cereal and legume crops, which is essential to delivery of the UK Cereal Pathogen Virulence Survey (UKCPVS) and our levy, commercial, and UKRI (UK Research and Innovation) pathology work.
Lecturer (Plant Biology) 0.6FTE, Bath
This will involve teaching small groups, lecturing, and delivering support on undergraduate/postgraduate courses as well as administrative, assessment and exam duties as required. This post will support learning and teaching in the area of plant biology.
Research Associate/Fellow (Fixed Term), Nottingham
In this BBSRC project, we seek to identify novel targets, genes, and pathways involved in sensing water in the model plant Arabidopsis. Building on our previous work (Mehra et al., Science, 2022), we aim to understand how hormone-driven pathways help roots to adapt to transient water stress conditions. This position is especially suited for candidates with an interest in root development and molecular cell biology. All the technologies required for the project are currently performed in our laboratory.
Post-Doctoral Research Associate in Plant/Crop Science, Lincoln
We are looking to recruit an enthusiastic Post-Doctoral Research Associate to work on a project recently funded by Innovate UK, focusing on managing nutritional stresses to enhance and prolong the duration of biological nitrogen fixation (BNF) to improve yield and yield stability in faba beans within the UK.
Instructor or Lecturer, Herbarium Curator, Plant Science Biology, Florida
The Department of Biology at the University of Central Florida (UCF) invites applications for a full-time, 9-month, non-tenure earning instructor or lecturer, anticipated to begin August 2024. The successful candidate will be expected to teach three courses per academic semester in the undergraduate biology plant science track, based on the unit's current workload policy, and will curate the department's herbarium collection.
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Virginia
The two (2) Postdoctoral Research Fellows will focus on building a digital twin for national-scale field-level crop monitoring, modeling, prediction, and decision support and automation.
Assistant Professor of Extension in Weed Management, California
This is a fiscal year position available July 1, 2024 with an 80% Cooperative Extension and 20% Organized Research Appointment in the Agricultural Experiment Station (http://cnas.ucr.edu/about/aes/). The position will be housed at the University of California Riverside campus in Riverside, CA.
Postdoctoral Associate (Bergelson Lab), New York
This ERC funded Synergy project, PATHOCOM, is a collaborative grant, which seeks to use the lens of evolutionary ecology and genetics to understand the assembly of plant phyllosphere communities and the mechanisms through which they affect plant health.