Latest Root Stories

American Journal of Botany Gravity affects the ecology and evolution of every living organism. In plants, the general response to gravity is well known: their roots respond positively, growing down, into the soil, and their stems respond negatively, growing upward, to reach the sunlight. But how do plants sense gravity and how do they direct or signal their cells to grow in response to it? Although botanists understand a great deal about how this works, a recent article in the recent issue...

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online An experiment reported in the journal BMC Plant Biology studied the effects of growing plants without gravity, helping to disprove one theory about how gravity kick-started plant behaviors on Earth. Astronauts growing Arabidopsis plants on the International Space Station tried to determine what plant growth patterns could be influenced by gravity. Plant roots exhibit characteristic behaviors called "waving" and "skewing,"...

ATLANTA, Nov. 21, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- ASPiRE today announced the world premiere of its new original series, THE ROOT 100. Hosted by Emmy(®)-winning television journalist and CNN Anchor Suzanne Malveaux, the weekly show is based on online news and commentary site The Root's (www.theroot.com) fourth annual list of 100 of the most influential African-American innovators of the next generation (age 25-45). Featuring first-hand interviews and video profiles of 24 of the list's...

OAKLAND, Calif., Nov. 15, 2012 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- Homegrown food is in for a radical change, and so is keeping fish. Back to the Roots, an urban mushroom farm in California, is launching a new home aquaponics kit via Kickstarter on November 15th. The Aquaponics Garden is essentially a self-cleaning fish tank that also grows a range of fresh produce in a garden on top. The fish water fertilizes the plants, and in turn the plants clean the water for the fish. (Photo:...

Root bacterial communities change under drought, help plants adapt to lack of water When there is little water available for plants to grow, their roots form alliances with soil microbes that can promote plant growth even under water-limiting conditions, according to research published Oct. 31 by Daniele Daffonchio and colleagues from the University of Milan, Italy in the open access journal PLOS ONE. Symbiotic relationships between plants and soil microbial communities are critical to...

Plants choose the soil bacteria that they allow into their roots Soil is the most species-rich microbial ecosystem in the world. From this incredible diversity, plants specifically choose certain species, give them access to the root and so host a unique, carefully selected bacterial community from which they then benefit in a variety of ways. To achieve this, the plant's immune system must be able to tell which of these bacteria are friends and which foes. Researchers from the Max Planck...

DALLAS, July 30, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- In the United States, we are amidst the worst drought since the 1950s[1].The area covered by severe or extreme drought conditions increased by 5% in the first week of July[2]. Although there are no overnight fixes for drought, preparing fields effectively before a drought strikes is the best plan of action. Farmers everywhere can rebuild, restore, and renew soil with Bio S.I. Technology's (www.biositechnology.com) all-natural Agriculture Formula...

Dodder vines are parasitic plants that suck water, nutrients and information from other plants as they spread over them. Plant biologists at the University of California, Davis, have now shown that they can make plants resistant to dodder by attacking the junctions where the parasite taps into the host. "We think that this will translate into other parasitic plants," said Neelima Sinha, professor of plant biology at UC Davis, who led the project. The work was published online July 20 by...

Plant scientists have imaged and analyzed, for the first time, how a potted plant's roots are arranged in the soil as the plant develops. In this study, to be presented at the Society for Experimental Biology meeting on 30th June, the team has also found that doubling plant pot size makes plants grow over 40% larger. From their 3-D MRI root scans, the researchers observed that potted plants quickly extend their roots to the pot's walls. It is likely that the plants use their roots to...

IGC scientists describe new transporter in cells of plant roots Plants cannot survive without phosphorus. It forms the backbone of many crucial molecules (such as DNA) and is a key player in energy transfer reactions. Low availability of phosphorus is a major environmental stress for plants and can lead to great losses in crop production. But plants can't make their own phosphorus; they get all they need at the root-soil interface, in the form of inorganic phosphate (Pi), so one way to...