The reason trees need sunlight is the same reason their leaves are green.
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Trees – and all plants – harvest sunlight to gain the energy they need to live and grow.
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Plants aren’t always as good at photosynthesis as you might think. Our research project wants to help them.
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Climate modelling that best accounts for the processes that sustain plant life predicts plants could absorb up to 20% more CO₂ than the simplest version predicted.
Researchers sample water from various layers to analyze back in the lab.
Elizabeth Swanner
An unusual lake with distinct layers of low-oxygen and high-iron water lets researchers investigate conditions like those in the early Earth’s oceans.
Native wildflowers, such as these Dutchman’s breeches (Dicentra cucullaria ) that bloom early in spring are losing access to sunlight as trees leaf out earlier.
Katja Schulz/Flickr
Many beloved wildflowers bloom in early spring, while trees are still bare and the flowers have access to sunlight. Climate change is throwing trees and wildflowers out of sync.
Sunset over New Zealand from the ocean sampling voyage.
Guy Shelley/Monash University
In the deep, dark ocean, sunlight-deprived bacteria turn to different sources of energy: dissolved hydrogen and carbon monoxide.
Heavy metals can be toxic to plants - and humans, too.
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Plants have evolved several ways to deal with heavy metals that might otherwise poison or kill them.
Science shows that humans are happier and healthier around other animal and plant species.
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People wouldn’t last long without the countless other species we depend on for survival.
Hasan Almasi / Unsplash
Plants lose huge amounts of water to catch the carbon dioxide they need for photosynthesis – but a new discovery may make them more efficient.
Katwe Bay in Lake Edward (Uganda)
Author
Thanks to their high concentrations of phytoplankton, African lakes emit less CO2 than their boreal counterparts, with important consequences for climate modelling.
When trees burn, all the carbon they have stored goes back into the atmosphere.
Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images
More carbon dioxide in the air doesn’t necessarily mean more growth for trees, and the increasing risk of wildfires and drought has major consequences, as an interactive map shows.
Most maize production relies on natural rainfall, making it vulnerable to changing rainfall patterns.
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Rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere may be a boon for maize crops in tropical growing regions like those found in much of Africa.
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Variegated plants can be more expensive than their all-green counterparts. But there are ways to protect your investment.
Coastal redwoods in Felton, California.
Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images
New research shows that coast redwood trees have a surprising adaptation that helps them thrive in both wet and dry environments.
Changes in vegetation and temperature affect wildlife and humans, as well as the climate.
Lisa Hupp/USFWS
The growing season on the tundra is starting earlier as the planet warms, but the plants aren’t sequestering more carbon, a new study finds.
Southern Tasmania’s cool climate was thought to be a climate refuge for tall forests. But that may no longer be true.
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Though you might not think so to look at them, plants have a busy day.
Allium schoenoprasum , better known as chives.
Andreas Rockstein/Flickr
Plants need light to feed themselves, so they grow in ways that help them collect as much of it as they can. Sometimes that’s straight up, but not always.
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David Attenborough’s new BBC documentary The Green Planet shows plants are stranger than they first appear.
Ian Hogg
A billion-year-old ‘hydrogen economy’ in the frozen soil of Antarctica provides bacteria with energy, water, and the carbon that makes up their bodies.