January 20, 2008 – 4:58 pm
From ScienceDaily.
Throughout the tropics, ants and Acacia trees live together in intricate interdependent relationships that have long fascinated scientists.
Now researchers are reporting that in Africa, this plant-insect teamwork depends on the very antagonist it is intended to ward off: Africa’s big browsing mammals.
Researchers report that elephants, giraffes and other large plant-eaters spur Acacias to “hire” [...]
September 29, 2007 – 1:53 pm
From NPR.org.
A team of scientists says it has found a string of vast, rich forests in an unexpected setting: far below the coral reefs found in the tropical Pacific Ocean. The new forests are made out of kelp plants that harbor a huge range of plants and animals. Like tropical rainforests, they may be refuges [...]
September 27, 2007 – 8:52 pm
From Physorg.com.
While prescription medications work successfully to cure an ailment in some people, in others the same dose of the same drug can cause an adverse reaction or no response at all.
According to a research team led by Sean Cutler, an assistant professor of plant cell biology at UC Riverside, such variation in drug responses [...]
From Physorg.com.
Compounds found in pumpkin could potentially replace or at least drastically reduce the daily insulin injections that so many diabetics currently have to endure. Recent research reveals that pumpkin extract promotes regeneration of damaged pancreatic cells in diabetic rats, boosting levels of insulin-producing beta cells and insulin in the blood, reports Lisa Richards in [...]
From news @ nature.com.
It’s not just animals that can tell siblings from strangers.
Telling apart relatives from strangers is crucial in many animal species, helping them to share precious resources or avoid inbreeding. Now it seems that plants can perform the same trick.
Now, Susan Dudley and Amanda File of McMaster University in Ontario, Canada, have shown [...]