Many plants have gone extinct in their natural habitat, but persist as samples preserved in herbaria around the globe. The existance of these samples raises questions about the possibility of using them to “bring back to life” these species, for example, by germinating the seeds or spores available in the herbarium material. However, there is […]
Seed dispersal is a critical ecological process with far-reaching implications. On rare occasions, seeds can be dispersed over vast distances, far beyond the range of the species. These events, known as long-distance dispersal, have profound evolutionary implications by expanding species distribution and triggering speciation. However, a comprehensive framework for understanding is still missing. In this […]
One of the main challenges of seed-based restoration is incorporating seeds from as wide a variety of species as possible. However, the seeds of some species have shapes or appendages that make it challenging to use specialized machinery for direct seeding, which hinders large-scale restoration projects and may lead to the exclusion of certain species. […]
There is a growing number of studies showing the effects of rising temperatures on different aspects of plant life cycles and ecological dynamics. However, little is known about how a warmer world would affect plants’ reproductive performance; in other words, how many resources they invest in reproduction and how many of these are translated into […]
The cross between genetically distant parents is an essential source of genetic variation. This process, known as hybridization, might result in the loss of adaptive gene combinations due to the introduction of non-adaptive alleles. However, Imaizumi and colleagues show this is not the case with weedy rice and seed dormancy. In this study, the authors […]
Alpine ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to climate change since they are experiencing swift temperature increases and rainfall reduction. These changes have been shown to affect different aspects of plant life history, such as phenology and germination. In this exciting research, White and colleagues show us that climate change also affects seed longevity –how long a […]
Review: Seed sourcing strategies for ecological restoration under climate change “The local is best” is a mantra in ecological restoration: if you want your project to succeed, you should use local plant material since it’s already adapted to local conditions. However, ecosystems now need to withstand both current and future conditions brought by climate change. […]
Palms are a taxonomically and ecologically diverse group. This wide variety is also reflected in their seeds, with their species showing all combinations of dormancy and desiccation tolerance behaviors. Yet, comparative studies of their germination physiology are relatively scarce. In this paper, Santos and colleagues evaluate i) the temperature requirements and ii) ABA, ROS and […]
Knowing whether a given plant species forms a persistent soil seed bank is essential to understanding its ecological dynamics, yet soil seed bank studies are both labor-intensive and time-consuming. One could argue that models should help predict this. Still, seed persistence in the soil is shaped by multiple plant and environmental characteristics, so conventional statistical […]