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Celebrating Plants and People

  • Invasion Of Wild Shrubs Tied To Extermination Of Wild Dingoes

    Taken together, our results suggest a cascading effect. A loss of dingoes allows foxes and feral cats to thrive and prey on the small mammals that eat the shrub seeds. Fewer small mammals means the shrubs can spread. This is the first study to link shrub encroachment to loss of an apex predator like the dingo, and it could explain shrub spread in many other areas around the globe. Rewilding initiatives that aim to conserve or re-establish small mammal populations could help stop the invasion of these pervasive weeds in Australia, (Click on title for full story.)

  • Butterfly Populations Damaged By Increased Invasive Plants Richness

    Our results also highlight the potential cascading effect of plant invasions on multiple trophic levels. Indeed, invasive plant spread does not only lead to a decline in the phylogenetic diversity of plants, but also to that of butterfly communities. This suggests that other herbivorous insect groups, such as beetles or flies, are likely affected similarly by invasive plants, which calls for repeated analyses of diverse insect groups and potential effects on higher trophic levels (Click on title for full story.)

  • Will The Next New Fabric Come From Wasted Pine Needles?

    Pine trees are an important source of timber—600 million are chopped down each year in the EU alone. But while the trees are harvested for their wood, billions of pine needles go to waste. Or, they could be used to make Forest Wool, a new material (click on title for full story).

  • The World’s Highest Plants Reveal Secrets Of Plant Colonization

    No mycorrhizae were found on the roots, implying they are of little importance to the establishment and early growth of the plants. However, all roots were associated with a complex bacterial community, with richness and diversity estimates similar or even higher than the surrounding bare soil. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Ice Age Hunters Redesigned Ancient European Landscapes

    This research has generated new insights on the role of hunters in the formation of the landscape. It may be that during the coldest phase of the last Ice Age, some 20,000 years ago, hunter-gatherers deliberately lit forest fires in an attempt to create grasslands and park-like forests. They probably did this to attract wild animals and to make it easier to gather vegetable food and raw materials; it also facilitated movement. Another possibility is that the large-scale forests and steppe fires may have been the result of the hunters’ negligent use of fire in these semi-open landscapes. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Trying To Design The Most Efficient Solar Cells, Scientists Stumble Upon Photosynthesis

    When Gabor’s team applied these simple models to the measured solar spectrum on Earth’s surface, they discovered that the absorption of green light, the most radiant portion of the solar power spectrum per unit wavelength, provides no regulatory benefit and should therefore be avoided. They systematically optimized the photocell parameters to reduce solar energy fluctuations, and found that the absorption spectrum looks nearly identical to the absorption spectrum observed in photosynthetic green plants. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Cancer Patients Best Friend May Be Psychedelic Mushroom

    A pair of randomized, blinded studies published Thursday in The Journal of Psychopharmacology provide the most robust evidence to date that a single dose of psilocybin can provide relief from the anxiety and gloom associated with cancer for at least six months. (Click on title for full story.)

  • Why Do Sunflowers Face The Sun? A Selection Of Possible Reasons

    There’s been advances in knowing how sunflowers track the sun, but botanists are still arguing over why. And, to make things confusing, they could all be right. (Click on title for full story.)

  • When Women Saved Their Village By Fighting To Save The Forest

    “No one can cheat us of even one metre of our mother, the forest. She has given us life and we have given our lives for her (Click on title for full story).

  • The First Farmers On Fiji Were Ants. And They And Their Epiphytic Partners Cannot Survive Apart.

    Many species of ants live in symbiosis with plants, and both partners in these relationships profit. One of the most remarkable of these interactions is that between the ant species Philidris nagasau and at least six members of the plant genus Squamellaria on the islands of Fiji, which is the subject of a new study (Click on title for full story.)