Plants, particularly long-lived trees, need to balance nutrient acquisition, herbivore and pathogen defence, and ultimately organic matter decomposition. The intricate relationship between these processes is crucial for the survival and growth of trees over their extended lifespans. Zheng et al. investigated…

The global forest carbon sink is vital for mitigating climate change by absorbing CO2 and offsetting nearly half of fossil-fuel emissions. Over the past three decades, this sink has remained stable with minor fluctuations, but its future is threatened by deforestation, forest ageing, and climate…

Review. Lighting the way: Compelling open questions in photosynthesis research Photosynthesis is fundamental to life on Earth and a topic that all plant biologists should have a good understanding of, but it is also an incredibly complex set of processes, reactions and structures spanning great temporal…

Behind the manuscripts are researchers, professors, professionals and students dedicated to advancing the field of plant science. You’ve seen our First Authors on Twitter and Facebook— now, read more about why they chose to pursue plant sciences and click on the links to read their articles.   Peizhe…

Vascular cambium cells are meristematic cells responsible for secondary growth. Lineage tracing studies in Arabidopsis and poplar show the presence of single bifacial stem cells in each radial cell file that produce xylem inwards and phloem cells outwards. In a recent review, Wybouw et al. discuss the…

There is increasing evidence that silicon (Si) application to soils or leaves can promote plant growth through various means, including enhancing tolerance to abiotic and biotic stresses, but the mechanisms of this growth promotion are not always clear. Here, Bardhan et al. review how Si can promote…

Genome editing stands at the forefront of scientific innovation, offering transformative possibilities to manipulate the genetic code of plants, animals, and humans. A critical bottleneck for its application in modern crop improvement is the low frequency and error-prone integration of foreign DNA into…

Activation domains (AD) are parts of transcription factor proteins (TFs) that bind the transcriptional machinery (coactivator complexes) and lead to transcriptional activation. However, identifying ADs is challenging because they are often part of intrinsically disordered regions, which lack a defined…