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Getting the Most Out of Your Animal Feed
After learning about cellulose in early high school, my vegetarian mind often wondered how much more energy I could have potentially obtained if humans had the ability to digest cellulose. Of course, with cellulose being the most common biopolymer on Earth, it seemed inevitable that one day, a scientist...
Removing Arsenic with Genetically Modified Plants
Detoxifying soils that are contaminated with arsenic has always been difficult to achieve with human hands and instruments. However, the introduction of genetically modified plants may be able to reduce arsenic levels with much greater ease.
The gene of interest comes from the fern Pteris vittata, a...
New lentil variety proves improve crop yield
Posted by Jen in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, GM Foods on 05 4th, 2010 | No Comments
Growing up as the son of two Pakistani immigrants, I was fortunate enough to be able to sample delectable Pakistani cuisine on an almost daily basis throughout my childhood. As almost any South Asian will tell you, Daal, or a variety of lentils, is considered a staple that is eaten with almost every...
The Grouse Compromise
The sage-grouse numbers in eastern Oregon have been diminishing recently, likely due to overgrazing by the cattle of nearby ranchers. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will be examining the state of the grouse on a yearly basis to determine if Endangered Species Act protection is needed. Although it...
Just another effect of Global Warming
Whenever I fly to or from the Houston, I am always amazed at the vast greenery the city has to offer that I am able to view from my airplane window during descent and ascent. Although many look at Houston as an overcrowded, sprawling, and polluted metropolis, I absolutely love the place and its many...
Twenty years later, plant-mapping project finally comes to an end
Perhaps the most devastating effect of deforestation is the immense diversity of plant and animal life that is lost in the process. This effect is even further compounded when we talk about the tropical rainforest deforestation that has steadily become more and more commonplace over the past few and...
The Balance of Life
As a child, I would often ask my mom why things in nature are the way they are and she would always give me the same answer: to provide an overarching balance to the world. Although this answer seemed overly simplistic to me even as a kid, I have come to realize over the years that there was great wisdom...
Plants Get Stressed Out Too!
Posted by Pallavi in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, Research on 04 14th, 2010 | No Comments
Stress is the number one reason why students underperform and get depressed; as a college student, I can definitely attest to the negative effects of stress that I feel, especially during midterms. Sometimes, the pressure of too many things on my plate can push me to be productive, but when I feel as...
Pollen – The Nomad of the Plant Kingdom
Posted by Sarah in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, GM Foods, Research on 04 13th, 2010 | No Comments
About a month ago, just before getting into my car to head to work, I noticed that my shiny black car had taken on a completely new color without ever having visited the paint shop. As I quickly swiped my finger across the trunk, the culprit for this sudden color change was identified – pollen! ...
Helping Plants by Harming Their Enemies
Major impediments to plant growth include disease, malnourishment, and predators. Limiting any of these factors would greatly benefit plants struggling to survive. Researchers at the University of California at Irvine have concluded that insect-eating animals such as birds and lizards can reduce the...
So you thought silicon was only useful in making chips? Think again.
Almost everyone is familiar with the many uses of silicon in plastic surgery and the nanotechnology industry. What may shock you are the effects of this commonly used metalloid on plants. From ancient times, sunflowers provided extraordinary nutritional benefits and their beautiful flowers have contributed...
Quality Tomatoes are Less Dependent on Sunlight Than Previously Believed
Today, I realized how many new things I have learned from writing these articles! For instance, I was under the assumption that the tomato is one fruit that can be grown anywhere. This thought was based on the wide variety of world cuisines that all make use of tomatoes. However, apparently there is...
The debate continues on the history of flowers
This past week, I had the remarkable opportunity of visiting a country that has intrigued me for a very long time, that is, Japan. Since childhood, my older brother and I have been fascinated by this unique nation’s technology, culture, and viable economy that all seemed to have survived the immense...
Cup Plants Add Diversity to the Great Plains
Posted by Amar in Agriculture, Bio Fuels, Environment, Featured Articles on 03 24th, 2010 | No Comments
The Great Plains is known for the massive area it covers and the multitude of crops it produces. However, each individual lot of farmland may be limited in biodiversity. Currently, the Great Plains is slated to become the new home of a mixture of biofuel crops, such as switchgrass and prairie cordgrass....
Tobacco: Good for Our Health?
Negative connotations about tobacco are prevalent in many cultures across the world. However, upon closer examination, we may become a bit more willing to accept tobacco plants into our lives – but not in the way you might expect.
Tobacco holds a notorious reputation for giving people health problems...
Beans! Sharing the Nitrogen Love
Crops have always been plagued by insects, disease, nutrient-poor soil and drought. Now, it seems that one small part of the problem may be solved. One of the critical nutrients that plants require to grow is nitrogen. Nitrogen must be ‘fixed’ in order to turn Nitrogen from the air into a usable...
Location, Location, Location
The American Association for the Advancement of Science conference wrapped up on the 22nd of February, and the topic of biofuels certainly did not go untouched.
Many scientists have been addressing the commercialization of the algal biofuel production process. Thus far, the obstacle has mainly been a...
Yeast, lowering a plant’s winter heat bill
As I was thinking about my topic for this week’s article, I thought I would do myself a little favor by first baking one of my favorite homemade desserts: white chocolate bread pudding. Not only did this help to inspire my thoughts, but perhaps even more importantly, it fed my unrelenting appetite...
Back to the Future of Ethanol Production
The University of Central Florida has taken a leap through time and devised a method of harvesting ethanol from garbage items. Sound familiar? Yes, this scenario is not unlike the DeLorean in the popular science fiction movie, Back to the Future. It may be true that the future of clean ethanol lies in...
Water, without it we simply can’t survive
Posted by Jen in Environment, Featured Articles, Research, Strange But True on 02 24th, 2010 | No Comments
When we made the transition a little over a decade ago from the nineteenth to the twentieth century, many believed that we were finally closing the door on one of the most notably problematic and violent centuries in world history. Not only were two major World Wars fought during this period, but major...
Preventing the Proliferation of Nematodes with Plants
Originally shipped to the United States in the 1930’s to help reduce soil erosion, the Chinese bush clover (Sericea lespedeza) is now being used to promote the health of pasture-grazing mammals. When the Chinese bush clover is put into pelleted form, it can be added to livestock’s feed. When consumed...
Plant Buffers Prove Productive
Posted by Deepa in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, Health on 02 19th, 2010 | No Comments
The cycle of agricultural life across the globe occurs as a series of chain reactions. Scientists are now becoming acutely aware of the immense cross industrial impacts that stem from a few seemingly harmless practices in the agricultural world. Today’s featured study is one that investigates the impact...
Global Warming and the Decline of Crop Yields
Studies have shown that the yields of many different plant species decrease by as much as 30% when the temperature has surpassed 86 degrees Fahrenheit. Such a profound decline in crop yields would harm producers and consumers alike, and it appears that this problem may get worse with global warming....
Reviving Western Rangelands with Genetic Modification
In the western United States, extreme weather conditions threaten vegetation, wildlife, and surrounding communities. With conditions ranging from heavy snow in the winter to severe drought and wildfires in the summer, the plant life in these areas takes a brutal beating by Mother Nature. Under...
Invasive Plants at Walden Pond: bane or boon?
In the battle to survive and thrive in today’s world of unpredictable climate change, it may be that the invasive and non-native plants reign supreme. Charles C. Davis, an assistant professor at the Harvard Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, recently published his findings from...
Fire, Smoke, and Plants
There will be blood in a football game that sets two bitter rivals against each other. However, not all of the players are on the field with a mindset of inflicting permanent pain upon the other team. Some players, the good sportsmen, will be kind enough to help lift their counterpart up after a rough...
GM Forests: Raising the bar for Timber Production
Posted by Deepa in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, GM Foods on 02 4th, 2010 | No Comments
America has long embraced the wide use and consumption of genetically modified or GM foods in daily life. But now, there seems to be a new buzz in the air about using the benefits of genetically modifying trees to increase the rate of growth in the United State’s southeastern forests.
A proposition...
Tobacco Plants Scared of the Dark?
It is a common belief that going out at night is much more dangerous than going out during the day. Although reasons for fearing the dark differs amongst humans, the fear is usually rational and can often prevent unnecessary tragedies. As a teenager, I was often irked when my parents refused to let me...
A Filter for Fisheries
A few years ago, a friend of mine told me that we could minimize water pollution by using Brita water filters and scooping out water from local rivers and ponds. As preposterous as it sounds, the concept of filtering the water was actually a decent idea. But how could you get a filter to fix the pollution...
Help the Kelp
If you have never heard of or seen a kelp forest before, imagine sitting at an ocean floor as numerous columns of macroalgae tower above you and a plethora of marine life forms weave their way in and out of these pillars of plant life. These underwater kelp forests are not just visually breathtaking...
Global Warming Doesn’t Just Make the Desert Hotter
If I were foolish enough to brave the Sahara Desert mid-summer without water and rations, I would probably trek about 5 paces in before knowing that my journey would be futile. Desert plants, on the other hand, manage to ride out the treacherous heat and drought every day without much of a problem. If...
Calculating Pollution from Pesticides
Increased use of pesticides has always been deleterious to coastal habitats, as the pesticide runs off into local streams and rivers that eventually make their way to the coast. Unfortunately, it has always been difficult to measure the pollution that pesticides may cause, and understanding their long-term...
Arson or Mother Nature’s self-defense?
The motivation for most, if not all of wars is to accumulate resources for the aggressing nation’s or peoples’ benefit. A competition of resources is a motif that has been widely observed in the animal community. Surprisingly, a recent study in the December 2009 issue of The American Naturalist...
Ask yourself: What can your spice rack do for you?
Posted by Deepa in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, GM Foods on 10 28th, 2009 | No Comments
In the wild, what we think of as spices are actually a key component to a plant’s defense mechanism. Now, Dr. Murray Isman of the University of British Columbia recently published a study on these organic pesticides that has produced fruitful results. The research has shown that common household spices,...
A New Wave of Caution
This month’s buzzword in the world of biofuel production is Caution. The United Nations Environment Programme’s most recent report covers the issue of alternative energy in the face of growing sustainability needs. The report is a compilation of a large number of recent studies on biofuels and conducts...
Public Transportation: Not Always the Environment’s Friend
Posted by Sarah in Environment, Featured Articles, Health, Strange But True on 10 19th, 2009 | No Comments
Before taking your bike out for a joy ride on the same route that your bus travels, you may want to reconsider, or better yet, consult the nearest…tree?
A recent study, by scientists at Western Washington University in Bellingham, has uncovered that the leaves of trees may be very helpful in detecting...
Family First
The expression “family comes first” is one that has and continues to be relayed by virtually every culture of the world. In fact, as a student of Arabic, I was exposed to a peculiar Arab version of this motto that both denotes the importance of family while simultaneously establishing a hierarchal...
Corn Ethanol Production: Boon or Bane?
Posted by Deepa in Agriculture, Bio Fuels, Environment, Featured Articles on 10 16th, 2009 | No Comments
In the October issue of the journal BioScience, David Flaspohler and Joseph Fargione published their analysis on the impact of biofuel-dedicated land consumption on various wildlife populations throughout the grasslands. The journal article addressed the long term effects of America’s focus on biofuel...
Spending Before Saving (Carbon)
When an officer of a factory decides to buy a new, state-of-the-art machine that could double the productivity of the company, the officer understands that an initial investment must be made before actual profits are seen. The same concept can be applied to biofuels and the environment.
The biofuels...
Sharing is not always caring
Remember when our kindergarten teachers taught us the age-old, seemingly irrefutable rule that “sharing is caring”?
Well, in the case of weeds and their genetically modified crop brethren, a new study in the October issue of the American Journal of Botany has proven that not only is this rule a bad...
Australian Casuarina Plant Is Growing Rampant in Florida
A hybrid of the Australian invasive species Casuarina has been found growing wild in Florida. Traditionally, Casuarina trees have been planted as decorative foliage alongside boulevards. Recently, they have been become the tree of choice for blocking the wind in orange groves. However, as useful as...
Red Leaves in America: not just patriotic plants
In Europe, the tree leaves appearing during the Autumn season are predominantly yellow, whereas in America they are mostly red. Why? An article recently published in New Phytologist attempts to solve this mystery. The fact that plants produce anthocyanin, a pigment that causes leaves to appear red once...
New Plant Barcode System May Speed Up Nature’s Checkout Lines
While we may not think about it, we all know how much barcodes at the supermarket save time by quickly identifying the item we’re buying.
Scientists too have long understood the importance of developing an efficient way to determine the species of an organism. Within the last few years, a barcode...
Plant Aerosols
A team of lead scientists at the California Institute of Technology has unlocked a major piece of the pollution puzzle. Their research was focused on the process by which gases emitted from plants become aerosols, or airborne microscopic particles. Led by professors Paul Wennberg and John Seinfeld of...
Water Stress Reduction through Ancient Barley DNA
The state of Texas is currently experiencing its most enduring drought since the 1950’s, severely hurting its agricultural industry. Due to burned out crops, yields of Texas fields have been significantly reduced. With fewer crops, farms are unable to support their livestock. Agricultural losses are...
Yosemite National Park Endangered – Result of Climate Change?
America’s very own Yosemite National Park may not have escaped the ravages of global climate change. The famous park reserve is well known for its grand meadows, deep valleys and ancient giant sequoias, but it seems as though its illustrious charm may be declining.
A study conducted by United States...
The cost of carbon: Cyanide infused Cassava
Posted by Deepa in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, Health on 07 29th, 2009 | No Comments
New Scientist Magazine recently published an article discussing the detrimental impacts of increased carbon dioxide emissions on the cassava plant. Cassava is known to be an important dietary component for over half a billion of the world’s impoverished population. It is especially popular in the drier...
A Rise in Ozone Levels Yields a Rise in Hunger
Posted by Amar in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, Health on 07 28th, 2009 | No Comments
Many of us use the word “hungry” to describe how we are feeling at least once a day. To some, “hungry” is the sensation felt ten minutes before their lunch break. To others, “hungry” is waiting thirty minutes at an upscale restaurant for an exotic dish. However, to 1.02 billion people on...
Plants Use Camouflage Too!
Posted by Pallavi in Environment, Featured Articles, Strange But True on 07 23rd, 2009 | No Comments
Plants use a plethora of defense mechanisms to protect themselves from predators and harsh environmental conditions. They have hardwired physical and chemical defenses such as pointy leaves in cacti, thorns on rose bushes, and poisonous leaves on poison ivy. They also have adapted to include defenses...
Bigger isn’t always Better
In the plant world, It’s not all about size.
A breakthrough in plant research made at Queen’s University in Canada has nearly reversed the way that people view forest-dwelling plant’s hierarchies. Previously, scientists considered bigger trees to be more durable and more influential on their surroundings....
Synthetic Fertilizer’s Innocent Façade
At first glance, looking at a chart of worldwide agricultural production since the introduction of synthetic fertilizer would lead you to believe that our agricultural processes have never been more efficient, profitable, and positive. China’s grain yield per acre increased 98 percent in the 28 years...
Let the Salty Waters Run
Posted by Deepa in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, GM Foods on 07 15th, 2009 | No Comments
In a world full of worry over food scarcity, energy shortages, and fading non-renewable resources, plant biologists continue to bring us hope. This time that hope comes in the form of salt-tolerant crops.
A team of researchers, let by professor Mark Tester at the University of Adelaide’s Waite...
A little green goes a long way
Commercially available green jet fuels are on the horizon. Professor David Shonnard, Robbins Chair Chemical Engineering professor, completed a thorough study on the use of the Camelina Sativa weed as a replacement for petroleum jet fuel.
This plant requires very little agricultural input to yield large...
Didymo: Invasion on the Rocks
News Flash from plants’ photosynthetic cousins: Didymosphenia geminata, one of the fastest spreading single-celled algae strains in the world has struck again, this time in the waters of the Esopus Creek in Shandaken, New York.
Didymo, also known as Rock Snot, has been a growing concern for biologists...
Warning the Clones
University of California at Davis professor Richard Karban has published his most recent research in the latest edition of Ecology Letters. His research has shown that plants can warn nearby “clones,” or genetically identical cuttings, of forthcoming danger.
Karban’s group found that the sagebrush...
The Spectacular Debut of Snow Roots
Posted by Deepa in Environment, Featured Articles, Research, Strange But True on 06 18th, 2009 | No Comments
….brought to you by Evolution
The C. Conorhiza plant lives high in the Caucasus Mountains, which are nestled between the Black and Caspian Seas. A recent study in “Ecology Letters” reveals how C. Conorhiza plants thrive in the Caucasus Mountains, despite freezing temperatures at high altitudes.
A...
New Method of Gene Modification
Posted by Pallavi in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, GM Foods on 06 17th, 2009 | No Comments
When I first learned about modifying genes in my high school biology class I found it a fascinating, yet scary concept. Learning about how DNA works allowed researchers to develop a method of inserting foreign DNA into organisms, a potential solution to many genetic problems. I remember when we inserted...
The Proof is in the Photosynthesis
In a recent study performed at the University of Alberta, signs of increased plant activity were found in a variety of arctic lakes. In the study, six lakes were tested for chlorophyll-a content deep down in the sediment. Chlorophyll-a is a byproduct of the process of photosynthesis and thus, an indicator...
Antibiotic Resistance via Plant Fertilizer
The food chain can allow genes to be transferred from species to species across the planet. The consumption of many genes may not have any effect on us, but the consumption of say, an antibiotic-resistant bacterium, could potentially be very harmful. We are often notified of any outbreaks that could...
Phytoliths- the Scientist’s Tarot Card
Recent developments at the University of Western Ontario have unearthed a new way to dig into the dirt of history and track the earth’s climate all the way back through the last three ice ages and the interglacial periods.
Zhenzhen Huang, an isotope chemist at the university, has pioneered a method...
Forget the Charcoal! Go Bananas!
Posted by Sarah in Agriculture, Bio Fuels, Environment, Featured Articles on 06 2nd, 2009 | No Comments
The banana peel seems to have universal “appeal” in cartoon episodes. Whether a character slips and skids across the sidewalk or falls into the nearest trash can or mud puddle, loose banana peels somehow always lead to a cartoon character’s slippery demise. So in reality, where do all of the...
American Energy Industry Turns Over a New Green Leaf
This week in science policy the American Electric Power Co. and Duke Energy Corp. came to an agreement regarding issues affecting rainforest deforestation. The two major agreements that the corporations made were the use of 5% of greenhouse gas emission allowances in accordance with a cap and trade system,...
Organic or Not?
Posted by Pallavi in Agriculture, Environment, Featured Articles, Health on 05 28th, 2009 | No Comments
A note to start: the following isn’t a plant research article, it’s more of an opinion piece on a topic I feel is quite crucial for us, as consumers, to understand.
Earlier in the year we read about how easy it is to get tricked by fake organic milk. Recently I’ve noticed a higher surge of organic...
The Herbicide for Organic Plants
The products at your local grocery store are deemed organic if they fulfill certain requirements, including no use of pesticides, chemical fertilizers, and herbicides. So how exactly can organic plants remain organic if we use something to get rid of pesky weeds? The answer is to, quite simply, use an...
Gold: The New Green?
For millions of years, plants have generated their own energy by means of photosynthesis. This mechanism of converting sunlight into power has proven to be very successful for plants, but for humans, employing the sun as a power source is not quite as simple. After extracting a photosynthetic protein...
Getting Funky with the Fungicides
Green is the new Black. With the slue of “green” products raining down on us these days we’ve discovered that anyone in almost any occupation can use an environmental upload. The latest development in greening our world is that farmers too, have found a way to green their routine.
Green Fungicides,...
Divide and Conquer: Invasive Plants
Weedy, exotic plants have begun their invasion, but for some reason, our existing plants’ quality or quantity doesn’t seem to stop the plants from taking over. A study to understand why these exotic plants seem to outgrow and outlast our plants was undertaken. The researchers examined 243 European...
Why Fertilization Causes Lower Bio-diversity
Recently, in my psychology class, I learned about different types of psychological disorders, including various types of depression. One of these really caught my attention, called SADD or Seasonal Affective Disorder Depression.
People who suffer from SADD become depressed when they don’t get exposed...
The Catch 22 of Blue Skies
Cloudy, polluted skies may be just what the botanist ordered. A new discovery was made last week regarding the positive effect various atmospheric pollutants may have on global plant life. This study was published in Nature through the combined efforts of the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, the Met...
Who says you can’t be cozy while you eat?
Posted by Jen in Environment, Featured Articles, Research, Strange But True on 04 29th, 2009 | No Comments
A few years ago when my parents were thinking about purchasing a new home, I remember sitting down with a home builder who was showing off some of the state-of-the-art custom features he had recently installed in a few of his latest projects. Among these features, the most interesting (and perhaps most...
The strain of Nitrogen-fixing bacteria matters
As we walk around the produce at a grocery store, we tend to forget how fortunate we are to live in a global society and how unusual it is to have access to exotic fruits and vegetables that grow halfway around the world. Globalization has not only brought animals and plants out of their local niches,...
Deforestation Nation
A study conducted at the University of Groningen by Finn Danielson explored the impact of palm oil plantations on greenhouse gas emissions and their effects on biodiversity. The study was an extensive review of how carbon stock varies with changes in land use, compared to the reduction in carbon emissions...
Trees: Earth’s livelihood
This past weekend, I visited my older brother in New York and although I love the city for many reasons, perhaps my favorite part about the urban metropolis is the world famous 843 acres of lush landscape affectionately referred to by New Yorkers simply as, The Park. While strolling through Central Park...
The Sunny Side of Energy Collection
Professor Pavlos Lagoudakis at the University of Southampton’s School of Physics and Astronomy has led a team to develop a new range of photovoltaic devices based on nanotechnology. Photovoltaic devices are designed to mimic the light-harvesting system found in plants and, thus far, have been gathering...
Global Warming = Global Problem
This week, I came across something a little bit different, and perhaps more important (given our planet’s current predicament), than the articles I normally discuss.
In a week where an ice shelf the size of Jamaica broke off from Antarctica, we now definitively know that the once debatable hypothesis...
Present Hardship May Stem Food Supply Crisis
Gonzalo Oviedo, a senior advisor on social policy with the World Conservation Union, recently performed a compilation study based on various British and American sources on the agricultural state of affairs regarding the global food shortage. He analyzed the subject from the standpoint of environmental...
Anti-toxic tobacco…an oxymoron? Think again.
Given that 20% of the world’s population consists of smokers, cigarettes have become the single largest contributing factor to preventable and premature death around the world today. This is a fact that has been proven time and time again by numerous scientific studies, some of which have even been...
Beef, it’s what’s killing the rainforest
According to the Center for International Forestry Research a large amount of the deforestation occurring in the Brazilian rainforest is driven by the demand for Brazilian beef and the economic incentives therein.
“Probably 80 to 90 percent of all cleared land in the [Brazilian Amazon] is attributable...
“We’re Burning the Rainforest in our Gas Tanks”
Holly Gibbs, a research fellow at Stanford University presented the latest study on land use for biofuel production this Valentine’s Day at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
According to this study, the increased call for biofuels made from agricultural...
Diversity Is Good, Even for Plants
Since the Civil War in the latter half of the 19th century, some people in our nation have strongly pushed for diversity in the workforce and in schools. However, pushing for diversity was never really considered in modern agriculture, until recently, that is.
It is a widely known fact that nitrogen...
Start Your Coconuts!
Hearing the word coconut brings a variety images, scents and tastes to one’s mind. Some may recall their mother’s freshly baked coconut cookies or an oversized slice of coconut cream pie, while others remember the scent of their favorite body lotion or the taste of coconut water; but rarely do people...
LEED Certified, It’s all the Rage.
These days everyone and their Mothers claims to have a LEED certified building, but the committee has recently reconsidered its initial constraints about applying itself only to building structure. The new future of LEED certified buildings acknowledges the environmental impact of the specific natural...
Calling Captain Planet: West Coast Trees in Distress!
[A continuation today on the tragic story of the west coast forests] A study of over 76 Forest plots along the United States west coast in Washington, California, Oregon, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Southwestern British Columbia showed that trees in the West Coast are dying at double the rate they...
Global Warming, Global Tragedy
Just one week after his historic inauguration last week, President Obama is already making headway in the proposal of much needed new policies to assist with the global financial crisis we are experiencing in the world today. Running as a “green” candidate during the lead up to last year’s election,...
Forget Shingles, Plant a Garden on the Roof Instead!
Have you ever worked outside in your flowerbed on a day when the sun never seems to disappear into the clouds? As you dig up old plants and replace the empty spots in the soil with fresh flowers you think to yourself, “If this shade tree wasn’t here, I might just pass out from exhaustion!” Well...
Introducing Wide Open spaces, now not just for playing frisbee
The rising atmospheric temperature that the world is currently experiencing may be offset by something as simple as increasing the number of “green spaces” present in our cities. The findings come from a study done at the University of Manchester lead by Dr Roland Ennos, a biomechanics expert in...
When It Comes To Seeds, New is Gold
Revegetation, currently a global concept, restores environmental niches destroyed by pollution or over-grazing. Although the type of area, body of water, forest, or environmental region may differ, the techniques used to revive natural life have consistently been the same. Biologists and scientists...
Failing to see the Forest for the Trees
A 2006 issue of Nature named global warming to be a significant cause of the extinction of the Harlequin frogs. The study stated that rising atmospheric temperatures cause an increase in a specific species of fungus, the chytrid fungus, known to be deadly to amphibians. Today’s “amphibian crisis”...
Coming soon: Sugarcane Plastic Bags
The search for a replacement for oil-based plastics has unearthed a competitive alternative: sugarcane ethanol. Formally known as polyethylene it was first accidentally synthesized by German chemist, Hans von Pechmann in 1898. This malleable but incredibly strong polymer is found in everything from grocery...
Moving to Higher Ground
AgroParis Tech, a collection of French academic institutions, recently conducted a study looking at plant migration data from six major regions across Europe. The findings were that a whopping 118 out of the 171 plant species tracked have migrated northward and will probably continue to do so. As a result...
Global Warming, Acid Rain, and Pollution: How They Can Help
You may take a look at this title and see three horrendous things staring back at you. However, to the plant world, and partially our world, they might not actually be the worst things on the planet. As it turns out, global warming increases the length of the growth season of hardwood forests by about...
CO2 update: rising further still and now destroying Peat Bogs
We’ve all woken up in the morning having gotten more than the recommended 8 hours and yet somehow we feel more tired than the night before. The solution we often choose is more sleep, which sadly only perpetuates the cycle of grogginess. The environment suffers a similar issue, only instead of lethargy...
Intruder Alert: harmful algal blooms
Harmful Algal Blooms are wreaking environmental havoc at an alarmingly high rate, costing the per annum loss of tens of millions of American dollars invested in fisheries, aquaculture sites and other bio-dependent industries. As a result, Professor Sinjie Lin, an Associate Professor of Molecular Ecology...
Eat your veggies, wash behind your ears and…inhale your limonene?
With their age-old abilities to clean pollutants and particles from our air, soil and water, trees with medicinal, environmental and nutritional benefits may be mother nature’s newest pitch for keeping families healthy and thriving. Sixty-three year old botanist Ms. Beresford-Kroeger introduces...
Tel-Aviv aeroponics lab introduces Eco-Furniture
Professors Yoav Waisel and Amram Eshel from the University of Tel-Aviv discovered, along with their collaborative research partner Plantware, a specific species of trees that when grown in air, rather than soil and water, retain a soft root structure.
The lab, conducted at the Sarah Racine Root Research...
Plant News Stories March 13, 2008
Posted by Jen in Environment on 03 6th, 2008 | No Comments
Gene that controls ozone resistance of plants could lead to drought-resistant crops – One of today’s top environmental concerns is how global warming effects the environment. Researchers from the University of California – San Diego and the University of Helsinki in Finland have now...
Plant News Stories Jan 30, 2008
Posted by Jen in Environment on 01 30th, 2008 | No Comments
Nitrogen Fixation Process in Plants to Combat Drought in Various Species of Legumes – Although nitrogen is abundant in soil, it is useless to plants unless it is first reduced to other chemical forms like nitrate or ammonium. Organisms like soil bacteria are able to reduce atmospheric nitrogen...
Plant News Stories Jan 23, 2008
Posted by Jen in Environment on 01 23rd, 2008 | No Comments
New Genus of Self-Destructive Palm Found in Madagascar - Scientists have discovered a new genus of palm trees in Madagascar that comes with a surprising twist. What’s the twist? Well, there’s two, actually. One, these palm trees are very large (5m palm, 18m high – they can be seen...
Plant News Stories Nov. 26
Posted by Jen in Environment on 11 25th, 2007 | No Comments
Top Stories:
Illuminating Study Reveals How Plants Respond to Light -
Plants need sunlight to grow and flower. New research from the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research shows that the process of taking in light is very complex. Proteins within the plant’s cells prepare to respond to light...
Plant News Stories Nov 12, 2007
Posted by Jen in Environment on 11 13th, 2007 | No Comments
Top Stories:
Could ‘Hairy Roots’ Become Biofactories? – “Hairy roots” found on the roots of some plants are a type of tumor caused by a bacterial infection. The tumor results in a mass of fuzzy-looking roots near the site of infection. While a nuisance for plants, researchers...
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