From the Beautiful to the Bizarre

Meet some of the people featured in the February 2017 issue of The Scientist.

Plants have so much to teach us.

Intellectual property theft, gun violence, scientific failure, and more

The plant Lophophytum pilfers mitochondrial genes from the species it parasitizes.

A group of pea plants has displayed a sensitivity to environmental cues that resembles associative learning in animals.

A newly discovered protease could break down grain proteins that trigger celiac disease.

Researchers solve the mystery of 15-year-old mutant ferns with disrupted sex determination.

This fundamental form of scientific communication is threatened by modern recording technology and researchers who refuse to adhere to an age-old ethical code. 

A modification to traditional docking software enables the examination of a ligand’s passage into its receptor.

Warmth acts on a light-sensing protein similarly to the way shade does, setting off a growth spurt in plant seedlings.

Mummy berry disease coats blueberry leaves with sweet, sticky stains that smell like flowers, luring in passing insects to spread fungal spores.

Instrumental in launching Arabidopsis thaliana as a model system, Elliot Meyerowitz has since driven the use of computational modeling to study developmental biology.

The Donald Danforth Plant Science Center researcher links complex traits to the genes that underlie them.

Three methods identify and activate silent bacterial gene clusters to uncover new drugs

The challenges of adapting drug development to the age of personalized therapies encourage collaboration among industry players.

Eating members of your own species might turn the stomach of the average human, but some animal species make a habit of dining on their own.

A maple branch and shattered equipment led to the cohesion-tension theory, the counterintuitive claim that water’s movement against gravity involves no action by trees.