This Research in Focus is written by science writer Peter Minorsky (ASPB and Mercy College) who writes the monthly On the Inside column for Plant Physiology. This summary describes a paper by Castelblanque et al., in the October 2016 issue. Laticifers are specialized cells (or row of cells) that synthesize and accumulate latex. The latex … Read more
Scientists develop a new approach to genetic modification of maize and other grains Genetic modification of plants might be controversial in commercial applications, but it is undeniably useful for research purposes. Despite years of effort, it has been remarkably difficult to develop efficient methods for transformation of grain crops. Work published in The Plant Cell … Read more
Many schools and universities are embarking on a new academic year, so it’s a good time to remind you of some of the great resources available to help you teach (or learn) about plant biology. Many of these and others can be found at the ASPB’s Education and Outreach page. See also the American Phytopathological … Read more
Many schools and universities are embarking on a new academic year, so it’s a good time to remind you of some of the great resources available to help you teach (or learn) about plant biology. Many of these and others can be found at the ASPB’s Education and Outreach page and at the Education and … Read more
Our understandings of the forces that have shaped Earth and the forces that have shaped life on Earth have common roots. Charles Darwin was famously inspired by the work of early geologists such as Charles Lyell, who proposed that Earth was subject to slow but gradual change. This idea recurs in Darwin’s insights about evolution … Read more
One of the most important skills a young scientist needs to learn is how to read (and write) scientific papers. Some students begin to learn this in a high school biology classes, and others as they begin their university coursework. To help instructors teach these critical skills, we created two articles to introduce students to … Read more
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) has released a request for information (RFI) seeking input to inform future programs in waste heat recovery. In addition, ARPA-E is hosting a workshop on anaerobic digestion in October 2016 in the Washington, D.C. area. Those interested in working with ARPA-E on these issues … Read more
Recently, we’ve been profiling first authors of Plant Cell papers that are selected for In Brief summaries. Here are the first-author profiles from the August issue of The Plant Cell. Aman Y. Husbands and Vasudha Aggarwal, featured first authors of In Planta Single-Molecule Pull-down (SiMPull) Reveals Tetrameric Stoichiometry of HD-ZIPIII:LITTLE ZIPPER Complexes. Aman Y. Husbands … Read more
There’s a lot of buzz right now about indoor farming. I’m sure you’ve seen photos of fuchsia-illuminated lettuces hydroponically growing in abandoned warehouses, airplane hangars, and disused subway terminals (see for examples here and here and here.) One of the goals of these programs is to cut the energy costs of food shipping, and another … Read more
The National Science Board (NSB) met on August 9 and 10, 2016, under its new leadership of Maria Zuber (MIT) as Chair and Diane Souvaine (Tufts University) as Vice-Chair. During the meeting, the National Science Foundation (NSF) Director, France Córdova and a number of Assistant Directors presented an update on the ten “big ideas” for … Read more
Last month we asked “How do you keep up with the literature?” (cross-posted on the ASPB blog and Plantae). Several of you shared your tips, thanks! Here we’ve compiled the replies we received from you. Follow specific journals One tip is to follow the Twitter or Facebook pages of your favorite journals (in case you … Read more
We put out a call for some short write ups for the minisymposia at Plant Biology in Austin, TX. We’d like to grow this kind of digital coverage in the future, so if you’re interested in doing brief write ups of concurrent session talks at Plant Biology 2017, keep that in mind. Yao Luo, Research … Read more
One of the highlights of the 2016 Plant Biology Conference in Austin, TX was a panel discussion about the National Academies of Science review of genetically modified crops. ASPB had several members on this prestigious review committee, including Drs. Robin Buell, Neal Stewart, and Rick Dixon, who convened a special session to discuss the outcomes … Read more
Chemical genetics is a powerful complement to conventional genetics. Rather than knocking out gene functions, protein (or other) functions can be perturbed through the addition of small molecules. One advantage is that several related proteins can be affected at the same time, avoiding the difficulties that come from genetic redundancy. Another is that treatment regimes … Read more
When is a flower not a flower? When it’s an inflorescence (cue laughter). Plants in the family Asteraceae produce inflorescences that look like single flowers, but are actually made up of hundreds of individual flowers. In many species, their are two types of flowers. The ray flowers (also known as ray florets) produce an elongated … Read more
We put out a call for some short write ups for the minisymposia at Plant Biology in Austin, TX. We’d like to grow this kind of digital coverage in the future, so if you’re interested in doing brief write ups of concurrent session talks at Plant biology 2017, keep that in mind. Jennifer Robison (@OshnGirl), … Read more
We’re delighted to announce that the latest Teaching Tool in Plant Biology article “Carbon-Fixing Reactions of Photosynthesis” is published. This article picks up where the “Light-Dependent Reactions of Photosynthesis” left off. The Teaching Tool covers the core biochemistry of the carbon-fixing reactions of photosynthesis, as well as its variations, C4 and CAM. Finally, it addresses … Read more
This post From ‘Brain drain’ to ‘Brain circulation’: Global trends in international collaboration and researcher mobility was originally published on Editage Insights. The landscape of scientific research and publishing is fast changing. Scientific research is becoming increasingly global, and is no longer dominated only by the three science superpowers USA, Europe, and Japan. With China, … Read more
Recently, we’ve been profiling first authors of Plant Cell papers that are selected for In Brief summaries. Here are the first-author profiles from the July issue of The Plant Cell. Fangwei Gu, featured first author of Arabidopsis CSLD5 functions in cell plate formation in a cell cycle-dependent manner Current Position: Communication Specialist at WuXi AppTec. … Read more
2016 is the International Year of Pulses, which the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization has been celebrating throughout the year by releasing infographics, information and hosting events; see these and more news here and at #IYP2016. Pulses are “the dehydrated edible seeds of leguminous plants that produce from one to twelve grains of various … Read more
