Beans don't like the cold. Phaseolus vulgaris, also known as the common bean, thrives in warm weather. When temperatures drop, these plants can suffer, affecting their growth and value. But there's a helper in town: diethyl aminoethyl hexanoate, or DA-6. This growth regulator has been shown to ease stress from tough conditions. But how does it work on beans under low...

Rhododendrons, especially Rhododendron simsii ( R. simsii ), can face serious trouble due to heavy metal pollution. One such metal, cadmium (Cd), is particularly harmful to these plants. Cd can mess with their growth and how they perform photosynthesis. Not much is known about how rhododendrons handle this stress, so researchers looked into it. They found that ...

Ever wondered how grasses adapt to different environments? Scientists have been studying the grass genus Homolepis to understand just that. This group of grasses is special because it shows different stages of an important process called C4 evolution. C4 evolution helps plants deal with hot and dry conditions by improving their photosynthesis. Let's dive into what m...

You know how Rubisco is crucial for photosynthesis? Well, scientists took a look at how this enzyme operates in some early land plants like conifers and lycopods. They found that under conditions where CO 2 is plentiful, Rubisco's carboxylase activity in these plants was similar to that in modern C 3 crops. But when CO 2 is scarce, their Rubisco didn't perfo...

Did you know that plants have tiny powerhouses called organelles? And these powerhouses come in different forms, called plasmotypes. Scientists have been studying a small plant called Arabidopsis thaliana to see how these variations affect photosynthesis. They found that the genetic diversity among these powerhouses is much less in mitochondria compared to chloroplas...