Latest Plant physiology Stories

PORTLAND, Ore., March 21, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The world is facing unprecedented water challenges brought on by population growth, urbanization and shrinking fresh water supplies, and three in four people worldwide are at risk of facing a natural disaster - further exacerbating the crisis. As a leader in water transport and wastewater treatment solutions, Xylem Inc. is committed to addressing this critical need. (Photo:...

Genome analysis of “living fossil” sheds light on the evolution of plants Atmospheric oxygen really took off on our planet about 2.4 billion years ago during the Great Oxygenation Event. At this key juncture of our planet’s evolution, species had either to learn to cope with this poison that was produced by photosynthesizing cyanobacteria or they went extinct. It now seems strange to think that the gas that sustains much of modern life had such a distasteful beginning. So how and...

The evolution of plants and animals generally has been thought to occur through the passing of genes from parent to offspring and genetic modifications that happen along the way. But evolutionary biologists from Brown University and the University of Sheffield have documented another avenue, through the passing of genes from plant to plant between species with only a distant ancestral kinship. How this happened is unclear. But the researchers show that not only did a grouping of grasses...

Plants leaves are sealed with a gas-tight wax layer to prevent water loss. Plants breathe through microscopic pores called stomata (Greek for mouths) on the surfaces of leaves. Over 40% of the carbon dioxide, CO2, in the atmosphere passes through stomata each year, as well a water volume twice that of the whole atmosphere. As the key conduits for CO2 uptake and water evaporation, stomata are critical for both our climate and plant productivity. Thus, not surprisingly, the total number and...

The upsurge in droughts is one of the main consequences of climate change, and affects crops in particular. However, Anabel Robredo, a biologist at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU), has confirmed that in the case of barley at least, climate change itself is providing it with self-defence mechanisms to tackle a lack of water. Climate change is in fact also responsible for a considerable increase in the concentration of CO2, a gas that, paradoxically, is providing this plant with...

Nobel laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore once wrote, "Let your life lightly dance on the edges of time like dew on the tip of a leaf." Now, a new study is finally offering an explanation for why small dew drops do as Tagore advised and form on the tips, rather than the flat surfaces, of leaves. It appears in ACS' journal Langmuir. In the study, Martin E. R. Shanahan observes that drops of water have a preference for exactly where they collect on leaves as their surfaces cool in the morning...

Plant roots are fascinating plant organs – they not only anchor the plant, but are also the world's most efficient mining companies. Roots live in darkness and direct the activities of the other organs, as well as interact with the surrounding environment. Charles Darwin posited in The Power of Movement of Plants that the root system acts as a plant's brain. Due to the difficulty of accessing root tissue in intact live plants, research of these hidden parts has always lagged behind...

A 125-year debate on how nitrogen-fixing bacteria are able to breach the cell walls of legumes has been settled A 125-year debate on how nitrogen-fixing bacteria are able to breach the cell walls of legumes has been settled. A paper to be published on Monday by John Innes Centre scientists reports that plants themselves allow bacteria in. Once inside the right cells, these bacteria take nitrogen from the air and supply it to legumes in a form they can use, ammonia. Whether the bacteria...

Researchers discover the protein that transports sucrose to the plant’s vascular pathways Plants must supply their various tissues with the carbohydrates they produce through photosynthesis in the leaves. However, they do not have a muscular pump like the human heart to help transport this vital fuel. Instead, they use pump proteins in their cell membranes for this purpose. Together with colleagues from the Carnegie Institution for Science in California, Alisdair Fernie from the Max...

Treated seedlings are healthier, more vigorous after transplanting The quality of agricultural seedlings is important to crop growth and yield after transplantation. Good quality seedlings exhibit characteristics such as thick stems, thick leaves, dark green leaves, and large white roots. Scientists have long known that plant development and physiology are strongly influenced by the light spectrum, which affects seedling structure. Raising seedlings irradiated with blue light has been...