Tag Plants
Ecologist/hunter talks deer, plants, hunters and balance
UW-Madison Professor of Botany Donald Waller is a pioneer in exploring the impact of deer in natural habitats. For more than 20 years, Waller - who counts himself among the state's deer hunters - has led research on the economic, health and environmental impacts of deer, including:
UW team’s plants return to Earth after growing in space
Researchers at Simon Gilroy's lab in the Department of Botany at the University of Wisconsin–Madison expect to greet a truck this afternoon that is carrying small containers holding more than 1,000 frozen plants that germinated and grew aboard the International Space Station.
Dwindling wind may tip predator-prey balance
Bent and tossed by the wind, a field of soybean plants presents a challenge for an Asian lady beetle on the hunt for aphids. But what if the air - and the soybeans - were still?
Campus botany gardener: transplant master
To hear master gardener Mo Fayyaz tell it, raising plants is straightforward: Get the right light, temperature, soil and water. Keep your eyes open. If one thing doesn’t work, try something else. And if everything fails, choose another plant. “You cannot just plant a rose in the shade and expect much,” he says. In 1984, Fayyaz secured his present job, director of UW–Madison’s Botany Garden and Greenhouse, and he began a long campaign to nurture and expand a garden that supports teaching and research in the biological sciences.
Project prepares collection for 21st-century challenge of invasive species
At the Wisconsin State Herbarium, director Kenneth Cameron is spearheading a new, three-year project to “digitize” images and data on aquatic and wetland plants, mollusks and fish from the Great Lakes basin. The $2.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation will also be disbursed to natural history museums at UW campuses in Stevens Point, Milwaukee and La Crosse, and in every other Great Lakes state. Together, these institutions expect to digitize 1.73 million specimens related to Great Lakes invasives.
A touching story: The ancient conversation between plants, fungi and bacteria
The mechanical force that a single fungal cell or bacterial colony exerts on a plant cell may seem vanishingly small, but it plays a heavy role in setting up some of the most fundamental symbiotic relationships in biology. In fact, it may not be too much of a stretch to say that plants may have never moved onto land without the ability to respond to the touch of beneficial fungi, according to a new study led by Jean-Michel Ané, a professor of agronomy at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Herbarium director receives award for telling the story of plants
Ken Cameron, director of the Wisconsin State Herbarium, received the Peter Raven Award from the American Society of Plant Taxonomists Aug. 5. Cameron, also a professor of botany at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, is a world expert on the orchid family.
New analysis links tree height to climate
What limits the height of trees? Is it the fraction of their photosynthetic energy they devote to productive new leaves? Or is it their ability to hoist water hundreds of feet into the air, supplying the green, solar-powered sugar factories in those leaves?
Fundamental plant chemicals trace back to bacteria
A fundamental chemical pathway that all plants use to create an essential amino acid needed by all animals to make proteins has now been traced to two groups of ancient bacteria. The pathway is also known for making hundreds of chemicals, including a compound that makes wood strong and the pigments that make red wine red.
Drilling in the dark: Biological impacts of fracking still largely unknown
As production of shale gas soars, the industry's effects on nature and wildlife remain largely unexplored, according to a study by a group of conservation biologists published in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment on August 1.
Tricking plants to see the light may control the most important twitch on Earth
Copious corn growing in tiny backyard plots? Roses blooming in December? Thanks to technology that the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Richard Vierstra has been developing for years, these things may soon be possible. And now, new findings out of the genetics professor’s lab promise to advance that technology even further.
How plants adapt: Calcium waves help the roots tell the shoots
For Simon Gilroy, sometimes seeing is believing. In this case, it was seeing the wave of calcium sweep root-to-shoot in the plants the University of Wisconsin–Madison professor of botany is studying that made him a believer.
Seed dispersal gets a test in carved-out ‘habitat corridors’
Field ecologists go to great lengths to get data: radio collars and automatic video cameras are only two of their creative techniques for documenting the natural world. So when a group of ecologists set out to see how wind moves seeds through isolated patches of habitat carved into a longleaf pine plantation in South Carolina, they twisted colored yarn to create mock seeds that would drift with the wind much like native seeds.
‘Cabinet of curiosities’ captures nature through work of artists and scientists
Of all the places Sierra Swenson expected to end up during her first semester at college, precious few were lined with jars full of preserved reptiles.
Wisconsin researchers identify key pathway for plant cell growth
For plants, the only way to grow is for cells to expand. Unlike animals, cell division in plants happens only within a tiny region of the root and stem apex, making cell expansion the critical path to increased stature.
Horticulture Society to host fall plant sale
The Horticulture Society of UW–Madison is holding its annual Fall Plant Sale Fundraiser Friday through Sunday at the Stock Pavilion, 1575 Linden Dr., next to the Babcock Hall Dairy Store.
Eavesdropping plants prepare to be attacked
In a world full of hungry predators, prey animals must be constantly vigilant to avoid getting eaten. But plants face a particular challenge when it comes to defending themselves.
Industry helps create new potato breeding professorship
Advances in biotechnology such as DNA sequencing have helped speed the pace of plant breeding in many food crops, but applying these tools to the potato, which has an extra set of chromosomes, has been a bit more difficult.