Plants’ ability to sense light and temperature, and their ability to adapt to climate change, hinges on free-forming structures in their cells whose function was, until now, a mystery. For the first ...

Meiosis is a special type of cell division necessary for sexual reproduction in eukaryotes, such as fungi, plants and animals 1. Meiosis is a reductive division that involves a single round of DNA ...

Past genetic experiments have shown that, when plants are grafted together, entire genomes can move between the host and the graft, but it was not clear how the genetic material was traveling. In a ...

The fine hairs on the underside of this sunflower are trichomes, single-celled structures that can shed light on how plant cells get their shape. (Purdue Agricultural Communication/Tom Campbell) ...

This review describes exciting advances in the use of green fluorescent protein (GFP) and its spectral derivatives to conventional and new imaging techniques in plants. GFP can be used in the study of ...

Planta publishes timely and substantial articles on all aspects of plant biology, and features original research papers on any plant species. Areas of interest include biochemistry, bioenergy, ...

Bacteria are only the only organisms that are able to 'fix' nitrogen, or remove it from the atmosphere and convert it into a useful form. While some plants seem to fix nitrogen, it is actually ...

Since environmental pollution by potentially acidic gases such as SO2 causes proton release inside leaf tissues, homogenates of needles of spruce (Picea abies) and fir (Abies alba) and of leaves of ...

Green is a color that is almost universally associated with plants -- for good reason. The green pigment chlorophyll is essential to plants' ability to generate food; but what happens if they don't ...

Bright red, tasty and healthy, that's how we know and love bell peppers. In a first, a team has deciphered in detail at the protein level what makes them turn red as they ripen. At the heart of the ...