Biologists have long thought that seed traits, such as the presence of wings, are the key to predicting in what way, and how ...

Scientists have discovered one of the earliest examples of a winged seed, granting insight into the origin and early evolution of wind dispersal strategies in plants. The study, published today as the ...

Knowing what causes dandelions to spread could help us understand how the plants respond to climate change, and could even help us design new "soft" robots. Known for their fluffiness and uncanny ...

Newly formed tetraploid plants in sympatry with their diploid progenitors should face significant obstacles to persistence and population establishment because of low-fitness triploids formed by cross ...

The plants we consume for food have changed drastically in the 10,000 years since humans began practicing agriculture, but hominids have been intensively interacting with the plants and animals around ...

Oahu's ecosystems have been so affected by species extinctions and invasions that most of the seeds dispersed on the island belong to nonnative plants, and most of them are dispersed by nonnative ...

If you liked this story, share it with other people. Scientists are just beginning to uncover the complex relationship between healthy biodiverse tropical forests and seed dispersers—species that ...

Picture a mature, broad-branched tree like an oak, maple or fig. How does it reproduce so that its offspring don't grow up in its shadow, fighting for light? The answer is seed dispersal. Plants have ...