A weekly plant science research roundup curated and summarized by our Plantae Editors and Fellows
Recently, a team of agricultural economists (Pardey et al.) released a powerful commentary about the state of agricultural research funding, which they say is insufficient. They observe that, fueled in part by the changing climate, food prices are rising everywhere, but they are forecast to rise…
Many factors contribute to global hunger, but progress in many sensible directions such as lowering waste and improving distribution has been negligible; furthermore, the ever growing challenges of climate…
Reading this review brought to mind some well-known lyrics starting “You don’t know what you’ve got …” Joni Mitchell followed with “till its gone,” whilst Blink-182 suggested “till it’s…
Plants are the quiet architects of life on Earth, sustaining the ecosystem through their ability to capture energy, cycle nutrients, and adapt to extreme environments. Their remarkable plasticity allows…
Plant development depends on the precise regulation of cell wall mechanics, largely controlled by the methylesterification status of pectin. Although pectin remodeling is known to influence cell expansion…
Agrobacterium tumefaciens, through its natural capacity to deliver foreign DNA into plant genomes, has enabled efficient transformation across many plant species and cultivars. Despite these advancements,…
Distant hybridization is an important route for crop improvement, enabling the transfer of disease resistance and stress tolerance from wild relatives, but in Brassicaceae it is strongly restricted by…
Directed evolution aims to identify variants of a gene of interest (GOI) with improved or novel functions by accelerating mutation and selection under experimental conditions. However, in planta platforms…
In nature, plants often face multiple attackers simultaneously, giving rise to complex three-way interactions that can reshape defense outcomes in unexpected ways. An intriguing example comes from observations…
This is the last edition of PSRW before the new year. Although we have spent the past year celebrating the breakthroughs in plant science, I am going to end on a more sober note, which is succinctly captured…
This review by Rai et al., part of a focus collection on metabolism, comprehensively covers the role of metabolomics in plant biology: its history, its tools and techniques, and its impact. As the authors…
The “Green Revolution” transformed global food production through the use of fertilizer, but at the expense of rising costs and reliance on non-renewable inputs, prompting modern agriculture to shift…
Each week, the Plantae editors select new plant science research articles to highlight. The short summaries describe the question addressed and key findings, with links to the article.
