Forest & trees
- Dying trees in cities? Blame it on the pavement - A new study of urban tree life in the Southeast shows pavement and concrete may have a bigger effect than longitudinal warming.
- Tree rings tell climate stories that technology can't - A new study shows how information revealed by a new method of analyzing tree rings matches the story told by more high-tech equipment over the short-term. Because trees are long-lived, looking back in their rings with this new approach may add decades or even centuries to our understanding of carbon storage and climate change in forests.
- The paper mulberry coevolved with soil microbes to humanity's benefit - The paper mulberry evolved its uniquely fibrous inner bark around 31 million years ago, long before the woody tree was first used for bookmaking during China's Tang dynasty. This adaptation, which makes the nutrient-rich plant easy to pass through foraging animals, may have been its way of feeding nearby soil microbes. Botanists in China discovered this connection in the first analysis of the Broussonetia papyrifera genome.