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John Seiler, a faculty member in the Department of Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation in the College of Natural Resources and Environment, recently…... 
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Black cottonwood trees (Populus trichocarpa) can clone themselves to produce offspring that are connected to their parents by the same root system. Now, after the first genome-wide analysis of a tree, it turns out that the connected clones have many genetic differences, even between tissues from the top and bottom of a single tree. The variation within a tree is as great as the variation across unrelated trees. Such somatic mutations — those that occur in cells other than sperm or eggs — are familiar to horticulturalists, who have long bred new plant varieties by grafting mutant branches onto ‘normal’ stocks. But until now, no one has catalogued the total number of somatic mutations in an individual plant.
In one tree, the top buds of the parent and offspring were genetically closer to each other than to their respective roots or lower branches. In another tree, the top bud was closer to the reference cottonwood genome than to any of the other tissues from the same individual.The tissue-specific mutations affected mainly genes involved in cell death, immune responses, metabolism, DNA binding and cell communication. Olds think that this may be because many of the mutations are harmful, and the tree reacts by destroying the mutated tissues or altering its metabolic pathways and the way it controls its genes, which leads to further mutations.
The findings have parallels to cancer studies, which have recently shown that separate parts of the same tumor can evolve independently and build up distinct genetic mutations, meaning that single biopsies give only a narrow view of the tumor’s diversity. Via Dr. Stefan Gruenwald
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Researchers have found that leafier places in Baltimore tend to have lower crime rates than those with few or no trees.
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Plants have long been known as the lungs of the earth, but a new finding has found they may also play a role in electrifying the atmosphere.
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Animators will soon be able to construct startlingly realistic sylvan beauty in movies and video games with a new system for generating 3D virtual trees...
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From
io9
Check out a modified record player that reads growth rings from a tree like musical notes. Created by German artist Bartholomäus Traubeck, Years takes the annual rings that you find in cross-sections of trees and converts them into piano music.
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Inspiration and interpretation are inevitable. As metaphor is basic to what we do, so emerging results in neuroscience will be taken well beyond the intentions and even meanings of their authors. Much caution and critique will be needed. Yet at the same time, I want to preserve a space for this other mantle, from science to art and humanism. To creation and design and expression.
A revolution based on neuroscience? No. A recognition of our bodies and experiences and senses? Yes. And thus much closer to metaphors that inspire us every day. Like HOME or WARMTH. And maybe even a tree or two.
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Some 500 years ago, Leonardo da Vinci noted that branches on trees split with mathematical precision. Recently, physicists studying this phenomenon have discovered it has important implications for the way wind flows around and through trees.
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Trees almost always grow so that the total thickness of their branches at a particular height is equal to the thickness of their trunks. Until now, no one has been able to explain why trees obey this rule, which Leonardo da Vinci first noticed.
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When you see a tree, a big, tall, heavy one, and you wonder where did it get its mass, its thick trunk, its branches — the instinctive answer would be from the soil below, plus a little water (and, in some mysterious way, sunshine), right?
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Spike in carbon-14 levels indicates a massive cosmic event — but supernovae and solar flares ruled out.
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Wealthy cities seem to have it all. Expansive, well-manicured parks. Fine dining. Renowned orchestras and theaters. More trees. Wait, trees?
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The links between trees, forests and improved mental and physical health are becoming clearer, with an increasing amount of applied research providing a more solid evidence base. When researchers offer explanations as to why such links are evidenced, their theories tend to ultimately be grounded in psycho-evolutionary theory or what the Biologist E.O Wilson termed ‘Biophilia’.
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See National Geographic photo editors' favorite news pictures of the month—a winter swimmer, burned Egyptian treasures, and more.
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Leonard Bosgraaf, Ph.D., Molecular Shots, Inc, of Groningen, The Netherlands, for "Firing Neurons," a movie created entirely by computer animation.
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More than 500 years ago, Leonardo da Vinci observed a particular relationship between the size of a tree’s trunk and the size of its branches. Specifically, the combined cross-sectional areas of a tree’s daughter branches are equal to the cross-sectional area of the mother branch. However, da Vinci didn’t know why tree branching followed this rule, and few explanations have been proposed since then. But now in a new study, physicist Christophe Eloy from Aix-Marseille University in Aix-en-Provence, France, has shown that this tree structure may be optimal for enabling trees to resist wind-induced stresses.
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As trees shed their foliage this fall, they reveal a mysterious, nearly universal growth pattern first observed by Leonardo da Vinci 500 years ago: a simple yet startling relationship that always holds between the size of a tree's trunk and sizes...
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