Scientists invent transparent soil to reveal the secret life of plants Lettuce grown in transparent soil developed by researchers at the James Hutton Institute and the University of Abertay Dundee in Scotland Most people’s image of plants is actually upside down. For most of our photosynthetic friends, the majority of the plant is underground in the form of an intricate system of roots. The bit that sticks up is almost an afterthought. That’s a problem for scientists trying to study plants because growing them in media that allow you to see the roots, such as hydroponics, doesn't mimic real soil very well. Developed by a team led by Lionel Dupuy, a theoretical biologist in the Ecological Sciences group at the James Hutton Institute, the transparent soil is the result of two years of research. It’s made from granules of Nafion, which is a lot easier than calling it a sulfonated tetrafluoroethylene based fluoropolymer-copolymer. The team's research is published in the journal PLOS One. Source: James Hutton Institute About the Author
The Ultimate Babble Noise Machine | Free, Online & Calibrated In open offices, overheard conversations are often cited as the main source of distraction: disregarding human speech is a very difficult task for the human brain, especially when speech is intelligible. One way of reducing the annoyances of intelligible speech is to mask speech using natural noises such as our Rain and Stream Noises, or this babble noise, as further explained. Babble noise can be used in an office for privacy reasons as well, when calls or conversations need to remain confidential. Private offices often appear to provide privacy but often do not perform well in terms of acoustics. Sound masking between adjacent offices can be used to ensure that confidential conversations remain confidential. When the frequency characteristics of the masking noise differ to much from the noise you are willing to camouflage, higher masking levels will be needed to cover the nuisance. In our case, this strategy consists of using one babble noise to mask another.
logy Magazine Atmospheric oxygen really took off on our planet about 2.4 billion years ago during the Great Oxygenation Event. At this key juncture of our planet’s evolution, species had either to learn to cope with this poison that was produced by photosynthesizing cyanobacteria or they went extinct. It now seems strange to think that the gas that sustains much of modern life had such a distasteful beginning. So how and when did the ability to produce oxygen by harnessing sunlight enter the eukaryotic domain, that includes humans, plants, and most recognizable, multicellular life forms? One of the fundamental steps in the evolution of our planet was the development of photosynthesis in eukaryotes through the process of endosymbiosis. This crucial step forward occurred about 1.6 billion years ago when a single-celled protist captured and retained a formerly free-living cyanobacterium. Bhattacharya leads the Rutgers Genome Cooperative that has spread the use of genome methods among university faculty.
The Open Organisation Of Lockpickers :: Meetings This is a repository of the most up-to-date versions of Deviant's lock diagrams and animations. Seen in all of the TOOOL educational materials and slide decks, these files are all released under the Creative Commons license. You are free to use any of them for non-commercial purposes, as long as they are properly attributed and the same freedom for others is maintained in all derivative works. Please note that these diagrams have evolved and developed over time. While Deviant is still proud of the older versions of his images, if you still have copies of legacy material they should all be replaced with the latest versions available here. Each image shown below in thumbnail form can be accessed in high resolution individually, or you can obtain the full set from the zip archive at the bottom of this page. Lock Basics and Mechanical Operation How pin tumblers are arranged and how locks operate (or fail to) with conventional keys Introduction to Lockpicking Manipulation-Resistant Locks
Flowers in Ultra-Violet The compilation of species will continue to be updated at irregular intervals. All species listed here have been documented, and links are added whenever I can find spare time for updating. These images are made for illustrative purposes, not as artistic statements per se. However, there are lots of food for thought in the convoluted ways Nature expresses itself, so for once the artist can step backand let the subjects speak for themselves. If you are unfamiliar with the botany, just select any species indicated as having a "strong" response to learn how this looks. However, not all species have the typical bull's-eye UV pattern, which may be confined to symmetrical flowers. The UV range of the spectrum has no predefined colours, so we are free to assign any colour we like. UV fluorescence may be a common trait to most flowers, but might be of temporary occurrence for parts of the flower. In case you are curious as to why the species might have these patterns, read this to learn more.
Electricity from the marshes An unexpected source of new, clean energy has been found: the Plant-Microbial Fuel Cell that can generate electricity from the natural interaction between living plant roots and soil bacteria. The technique already works on a small scale and will soon be applied in larger marshland areas throughout the world. On 23 November, researcher Marjolein Helder will defend her PhD research on generating electricity via plants at Wageningen University, part of Wageningen UR. She has also founded a spin-off company called Plant-e with her colleague David Strik. The Plant-Microbial Fuel Cell draws electricity from the soil while the plants continue to grow. The Plant-Microbial Fuel Cell can currently generate 0.4 Watt per square metre of plant growth. Marshlands Plant-Microbial Fuel Cells can be used on various scales. Marjolein Helder's PhD research did not only focus on the technical aspects of the Plant-Microbial Fuel Cell, but also on how the technology could be integrated into society.
Plants and fungi play the 'underground market' Science 12 Aug 11 Micrograph of fungi colonising roots of plant host, Medicago truncatula. Image: Jan Jansa Plants and fungi co-operate and trade with each other on a biological ‘underground market’, changing their trading partners if they don’t get a fair deal. The finding was made by an international team, including Oxford University scientists, examining how plants trade energy-rich carbohydrate they make using photosynthesis for phosphorus fungi collect from the soil. A report of the research is published in this week’s Science. ‘This is one of the first recorded examples of a ‘biological market’ operating in which both partners reward fair trading rather than one partner having the advantage and exploiting the other,’ said Professor Stuart West of Oxford University’s Department of Zoology, an author of the paper.
Breaking News: Monsanto To Face Biopiracy Charges In India An farm worker assorting eggplants in the Indian state of Gujarat. by Arne Hückelheim/WikicommonsAccording to an article published this month in the journal Nature Biotechnology, Monsanto is facing biopiracy charges in India. In an unprecedented decision, India's National Biodiversity Authority(NBA), a government agency, declared legal action against Monsanto (and their collaborators) for accessing and using local eggplant varieties (known as brinjal) to develop their Bt genetically engineered version1 without prior approval of the competent authorities, which is considered an act of "biopiracy."2 The journal of Nature Biotechnology reported: "An Indian government agency has agreed to sue the developers of genetically modified (GM) eggplant for violating India's Biological Diversity Act of 2002. India's National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) is alleging that the developers of India's first GM food crop--Jalna-based Maharashtra Hybrid Seeds Company (Mahyco) partnered with St.
How the first plant came to be The genome of provides essential clues to the origin of photosynthesis in algae and plants. Science/AAAS Earth is the planet of the plants — and it all can be traced back to one green cell. The world's lush profusion of photosynthesizers — from towering redwoods to ubiquitous diatoms — owe their existence to a tiny alga eons ago that swallowed a cyanobacteria and turned it into an internal solar power plant. By studying the genetics of a "glaucophyte" — one of a group of just 13 unique microscopic freshwater blue-green algae, sometimes called "living fossils" — an international consortium of scientists led by molecular bioscientist Dana Price of the University of Queensland, Brisbane, has elucidated the evolutionary history of plants. According to the analysis of 's genome of roughly 70 million base pairs, this capture must have occurred only once because most modern plants share the genes that make the merger of photosynthesizer and larger host cell possible.