The Week in Botany November 17, 2025
I’ve a couple of things I should remember to tell you this week. First up, if you work in Plant Health in the UK, the Royal Society of Biology has 15 Plant Health Professional Development Awards available. The award is open to anyone who has been working in a plant health-related career for at least one year and is interested in applying to join the Plant Health Professional Register (PHPR) for the first time.
If you’re outside the UK, then the next item also applies to you. The University of Nottingham are suspending their BSc Plant Biology & MSc Plant Biology, BSc Agriculture & BSc Agricultural Business Management and other degrees. If you have to make deep cuts across a wide range of unconnected departments, it indicates that the problem isn’t in those departments but higher up. There’s a petition to protest against this, which you can sign. If you’re overseas when you sign it, it would emphasise the department’s international importance.
Looking ahead to next week, we have a seed dispersal crisis, surprisingly deep roots and a sneaky orchid. There will also be another email of the papers and the news stories you’re sharing on Mastodon and Bluesky. Until next time, take care.
Alun (webmaster@botany.one)
On Botany One
Sarah J. McInnes: “When You Really Stop and Look, You’ll Be Amazed By What You Can See.”
Botany One interviews Sarah McInnes, an Australian chemist who found her way into how plants regenerate after fire.
Utilizing historical data to understand patterns and shifts in ancient woodland species
Researchers found a rise in non-native species, particularly in woodlands near urban areas, indicating potential long-term damage to these ecosystems.
Trees Vs. Bugs: Novel Twists in A Timeless Plant Drama
The ancient evolutionary struggle between plants and insect herbivores never fails to surprise us. Science proven, watch it yourself!
…and last’s week’s Week in Botany with a fertiliser time-bomb, a taxonomic mistake that led to some odd results, and the fascination of seeds.
News & Views
Drax still burning 250-year-old trees sourced from forests in Canada, experts say
Report by Stand.earth says subsidiary of power plant received truckloads of whole logs at biomass pellet sites
James Watson, dead at 97, was a scientific legend and a pariah among his peers
He co-discovered DNA’s structure but later engaged in rank racism and sexism.
Reconsider the potential suspension of Plant Biology Courses at the University of Nottingham
A petition protesting against the cessation of further intakes for the degree at the University of Nottingham. Current students have been told their studies will continue unaffected, but this decision effectively erases a field that has been part of Nottingham’s scientific identity for decades.
What Rosalind Franklin truly contributed to the discovery of DNA’s structure
Franklin was no victim in how the DNA double helix was solved. An overlooked letter and an unpublished news article, both written in 1953, reveal that she was an equal player.
ASPB Introduces the 2026 Plantae Editors
Returning in 2026, ASPB has appointed its new group of Plantae Editors to further support Plantae’s growth and goal to serve as a community resource for plant biologists, by plant biologists. The Plantae Editors all served as Plantae Fellows in previous program years and are returning ready to support the 2026 Plantae Fellows.
Study finds deforestation fuels West Africa’s water crisis
A new study warns that deforestation across Ghana, Niger and Nigeria is intensifying West Africa’s water crisis, threatening the health and livelihoods of more than 122 million people.
Inside the CIA’s secret mission to sabotage Afghanistan’s opium
In a decade-long covert operation, the U.S. spy agency dropped modified poppy seeds in an attempt to degrade the potency of Afghanistan’s billion-dollar opium crop.
On Apple News
Critical Minerals? There’s a Plant for That
Could phytomining—using plants to pull metal out of the soil—put the green in “green transition”?
U.S. Congress considers sweeping ban on Chinese collaborations
Researchers speak out against proposal that would bar funding for U.S. scientists working with Chinese partners or training Chinese students.
Moss can be a key witness in murder investigations
Botanists say detectives are overlooking a potentially vital source of crime scene evidence.
There’s a Japanese word for that…
Nigel Chaffey explores plant-related Japanese words.
This Week in Botany
5 Years Ago: A step to the biofuels of the future?
10 Years Ago: Where were the first domesticated olives?
15 Years Ago: The roadside botanist, bananas and cassava biodiversity
Scientific Papers
Plant miRNAs influence soil bacterial growth and amino acid uptake, restructuring community composition (FREE)
Dozois et al show that Arabidopsis modifies its root miRNA content when fertilized with a mixture of 17 amino acids. The miRNAs that responded to amino acid fertilization and other rhizosphere-abundant miRNAs were applied to a simplified soil community, grown with diverse amino acid sources, to test if they interfered with microbial community growth, community composition and amino acid consumption.
Naturalized and Invasive Species Integrate Differently in the Trait Space of Local Plant Communities (FREE)
How alien plant species integrate into local native communities remains a widely debated but largely unresolved question. For 12,460 plant communities from six different habitats, Divíšek et al. show that naturalized non-invasive species integrate near the center of the multidimensional functional trait space of each community, whereas invasive species tend to occupy the edges.
A cell-type-specific regulon controlling monoterpene indole alkaloid biosynthesis with feedback and feedforward activation loops (FREE)
Li et al. investigate the cell type specificity of biosynthetic genes and coexpressed transcription factors (TFs) in two MIA-producing Asterid species, Catharanthus roseus, a well-studied MIA-producing species, and Camptotheca acuminata, which belongs to an early-diverging lineage of the Asterid clade.
Neighbor density-dependent facilitation promotes coexistence and internal oscillation ($)
Buche et al. investigate how neighbor density-dependent variation in the strength and sign of species interactions changes species and community dynamics. They demonstrate that incorporating these sources of variation significantly improves predictions of ecological dynamics compared to the outcomes of typical models, which hold interaction strengths constant.
Chromosome-level genome assembly of the photobiont microalga Trebouxia sp. ‘A48’ from the lichen Xanthoria parietina (FREE)
Tagirdzhanova et al. produced a chromosome-level assembly of Trebouxia sp. ‘A48’, a photobiont of Xanthoria parietina. The genome was assembled into 20 contigs, of which 16 had telomeric repeats at both ends and likely represent complete chromosomes. They compared this genome with those of other Trebouxia species and analyzed it to investigate adaptations to the lichen lifestyle.
Strange Plants And The Weirding Climate: Parasitic Plant Physiology Under Climate Change ($)
Luiza Teixeira-Costa hypothesizes that, in the presence of conditions that improve parasite performance, such as reduced intraspecific competition or increased diversity of host species, elevated levels of atmospheric CO2 can partially alleviate the negative impact of parasitism on host growth.
Spatial variation in the mutation rate within the plant shoot apical meristem (FREE)
The potential impact of new mutations on organismal function and evolution depends on the developmental fate of the affected cells. Stem cells in the shoot apical meristem form much of the plant body, but only those in the L2 can form gametes. This raises the question of whether the mutation rate is optimized for this developmental plan. To test this, Amundson et al. compare stem cell mutations accumulated over decades of clonal propagation in two potato varieties with those arising during leaf-cell regeneration.
Convergence and constraint in glucosinolate evolution across the Brassicaceae (FREE)
Agosto Ramos et al. explore the evolutionary patterns of the GSL-OH gene, responsible for producing specialised metabolites in the Brassicaceae family.
An arbuscular mycorrhiza from the 407-million-year-old Windyfield Chert identified through advanced fluorescence and Raman imaging (FREE)
Strullu-Derrien et al. combine confocal laser scanning microscopy and fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy (FLIM) to investigate a newly identified fungus and cellular structures of a 407-Myr-old plant from the Windyfield Chert, a stratigraphically distinct fossiliferous unit from Rhynie (Scotland). They also applied Raman spectroscopy to investigate the carbon framework of both fungal and plant tissues.
Auxin transport positions stem cells in the vascular cambium during normal development and regeneration ($)
Zhang et al. show that auxin transport-guided auxin accumulation in the cells with primary xylem identity (PXI cells) within the root apical meristem defines the vascular cambial stem-cell organizer already during the primary development.
A synthetic transcription cascade enables direct in planta shoot regeneration for transgenesis and gene editing in multiple plants (FREE)
Developing transgenic and/or gene-edited plants largely depends on tedious, lengthy, and costly in vitro regeneration protocols. While plants have remarkable regeneration ability, not all species, genotypes, or even explants exhibit the same transformation and regeneration potential under in vitro conditions. To tackle this bottleneck, Kshetry et al. have developed a seamless and user-friendly system to induce transgenic and gene-edited de novo meristems via a synthetic cascade comprising a wound-induced regeneration pathway, plant developmental regulators (DRs), and gene-editing reagents.
A common pathway controls cell size in the sepal and leaf epidermis leading to a nonrandom pattern of giant cells (FREE)
Arabidopsis leaf epidermal cells have a wide range of sizes and ploidies, but the mechanisms patterning their size and spatial distribution remain unclear. Clark et al show that the same genetic pathway creating giant cells in sepals also regulates cell size in the leaf epidermis, leading to the formation of giant cells
Catch & Release—rapid cost-effective protein purification from plants using a DIY GFP-Trap-protease approach (FREE)
Many conventional plant protein purification methods rely on expensive reagents, multistep procedures, and labor-intensive workflows, limiting their feasibility for many applications. Schwartz et al present the ‘Catch & Release’ system, a cost-effective, fast, and reliable one-step purification workflow for the isolation of proteins from plant tissues.
In AoBC Publications
Environmental context shapes sex-specific costs of reproduction in a dioecious plant (FREE)
Neighbor sensing through rhizodeposits in sorghum affects plant physiology and productivity (FREE)
Careers
PhD, The role of hairy ears in barley grain quality and yield, Edinburgh
The grass awn is a thin hair-like structure at the tip of floral organs. In barley we do not know the full role that awns play in grain development, and ultimately their impact on yield and quality in an increasingly variable climate. This PhD project aims to address this gap in our understanding.
PhD, From Recall to Reset: Decoding the Epigenetic Drivers of Plant Immune Memory, Sheffield
You will help generate a landmark dataset for in-depth epigenomic characterisation of immune memory in the short-lived annual Arabidopsis and the longer-living perennial tomato. Using a combination of genome-wide DNA sequencing approaches, such as Nanopore-sequencing, ATAC-sequencing, and Hi-C sequencing, you will work alongside a senior postdoc to characterise the epigenomic landscape at time points when the immediate (innate) immune response has subsided, but the immune memory persists.
Postdoctoral Researcher (Dr Miguel Montez), Norwich
The Postdoctoral Researcher will investigate chromatin organisation at a fine scale, with a particular focus on the dynamics, regulation, and biological functions of local chromatin structure in the context of how plants adapt to their environment.
Specialist Technician, Bristol
We wish to appoint a Research Technician to work as part of a team funded by ERC and NERC grants investigating how European forests are responding to rapid climate change and how this impacts forest restoration efforts. You will form an integral part of the Selva lab team led Dr Tommaso Jucker (https://www.selvalab.org), and will work closely with two postdoctoral researchers and three PhD students employed on the same projects.
Early Career Rescue Fellowship, Konstanz
Academic freedom is under pressure today. This requires rescue havens of free research. The Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS), the Tübingen College of Fellows (CoF), and the Zukunftskolleg Konstanz (ZuKo) invite early career researchers, whose work is restricted due to political pressure in the USA, to apply for the Baden-Württemberg Early Career Rescue Fellowships 2026-2028.
Postdoctoral Position in Plant Genomics/Bioinformatics, Düsseldorf
This three-year position (with extension possibilities) offers you the chance to work at the forefront of genome plasticity research, collaborate with our partner group at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research, and access the latest genomics technologies.
Two PhD Student positions (m/f/d) in Plant Pathogen Evolution, Kiel
Each PhD student will lead a project exploring how the blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae adapts to infect different host plants. Students will gain hands-on experience in modern molecular and genomic approaches while contributing to a deeper understanding of how plant pathogens emerge, and how we can better protect crops from disease.
4 PhD Positions in Ecology / Data Science and one Ecological Data Scientist, Regensburg
PhD Position (3 yrs, 65% E13) on understanding plant-pollinator interactions. The work plan contains a mix of field work, genetic lab work and data analysis.
PhD Position (1+3 yrs, 70% E13) on Theoretical Ecology or related subjects (e.g. Macroecology, Ecological Statistics, Ecological Modelling). This position is intended as a 1+3 year position for developing an open-topic PhD project in our lab.
PhD position (1+3 yrs, 65% E13) on Ecological Machine Learning, as part of the bAImo project (PI: Dr. Maximilian Pichler).
PhD Position (1+2.5 years, 75% E13) on Ecological Machine Learning, as part of the BaySenseAI project.
Scientific programmer / data scientist (100% E11, 2yrs or could be made permanent). We are looking for a person with experience in statistical data analysis, curation of ecological data and scientific programming (focus on R) that supports our research group long-term in the curation of datasets and maintenance of our software packages.
13th Utrecht PhD Summer School “Environmental Signaling in Plants”
We would like to invite you to join the PhD Summer School that has an attractive program with many expert speakers in the field of environmental signaling in plants. In addition to the invited speakers, there are 3 parallel sessions in the program for oral presentations by PhD students that will be selected from submitted abstracts.
Open position for assistant (tenure-track) or associate professor, Geneva
The University of Geneva is looking for candidates pursuing internationally recognized research in molecular or cellular biology, genomics, (epi)genetics, proteomics, systems biology or advanced imaging are encouraged to apply. The use of multi-disciplinary approaches and research topics that complement those of existing research groups is an asset. The successful candidate is expected to develop an innovative research program at the highest international level and secure external funding.