News by Subject Biology

An international research team, including scientists from CIRAD and the European Commission Joint Research Centre, has assessed the potential impact on primates of the expansion of oil palm cultivation in Africa. The authors of the study combined information on land suitability for oil palm cultivation with primate distribution, diversity and vulnerability. They concluded that it will be very difficult to reconcile oil palm development in Africa with biodiversity conservation. These results were published today in the American journal PNAS.

Maize plants release secondary metabolites into the soil that bind to iron and thereby facilitate its uptake by the plant. The Western corn rootworm (Diabrotica virgifera), the economically most important maize pest worldwide, is attracted by these complexes, extracts the bound iron from the maize plant and uses it for its own nutrition. With these insights, researchers provide a new explanation for the extraordinary success of the Western corn rootworm as a global maize pest.

Flowering plants are well known for their special relationship to the insects and other animals that serve as their pollinators. But, before the rise of angiosperms, another group of unusual evergreen gymnosperms, known as cycads, may have been the first insect-pollinated plants. Now, researchers reporting in the journal Current Biology on Aug. 16 have uncovered the earliest definitive fossil evidence of that intimate relationship between cycads and insects.

A study led by Indiana University suggests that computer models used to predict the spread of epidemics from climate change -- such as crop blights or disease outbreaks -- may not take into account an important factor in predicting their severity.

No species lasts forever, and, just as the saying goes, it seems like old species may get stuck in their ways and can't adapt to environmental change as fast as younger species do.

Forests in the eastern United States may have had it easy compared to their western counterparts, with the intense, prolonged droughts and wildfires that have become typical out west in recent years. But as the climate changes over time, eastern forests are also likely to experience longer droughts. And although wildfires are comparatively rare, prescriptive fires are increasingly used in the east. How will these forests fare in the future? A new study from the University of Illinois provides answers.

You know that smell of fresh cut grass? It's a cry for help plants use when under attack.