Poaceae is a large monocotyledonous plant family encompassing the true grasses, characterized by herbaceous, often culm-forming stems with hollow internodes, leaves composed of sheaths, ligules, and linear blades, and a distinctive inflorescence of spikelets bearing reduced, wind-pollinated florets. Flowers are typically subtended by glumes and lemmas, with lodicules facilitating anthesis, and produce single-seeded dry fruits (caryopses) in which the seed coat is fused to the pericarp. Poaceae exhibits C3, C4, and intermediate photosynthetic pathways, occupies diverse terrestrial habitats worldwide, and plays central roles in primary productivity, biogeochemical cycling, and the evolution of grass-dominated ecosystems.
Radar data from an agricultural area in South Africa, shown in a vivid color palette, reveal crop types and how they changed during the Southern Hemisphere's growing season.
Agriculture
May 29, 2026
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16
Most major crops, such as wheat and corn, require expensive nitrogen fertilizer to flourish. But what if bacteria could help those plants draw nitrogen from the atmosphere, as peas and beans do?
Biotechnology
May 28, 2026
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251
A new study shows crop species, and not soil type, primarily determines the beneficial functions provided by root-associated microbes. In the study, soil obtained from across nine UK locations was used to cultivate six key ...
Cell & Microbiology
May 28, 2026
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9
New research reveals that plants have the ability to detect their neighbors' growth rates through aromatic cues called volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and subsequently adjust how much energy they invest into their own growth ...
Plants & Animals
May 28, 2026
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22
Researchers from Sciensano, partner of the DARWIN project, have published a new paper in npj Science of Food addressing one of the key scientific and regulatory challenges linked to genome-edited (GE) organisms, their reliable ...
Biotechnology
May 27, 2026
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8
For about half the global population, rice is the staple food. Yet every year, a fungal disease—rice blast—destroys harvests that could feed 60 million people. Researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have ...
Molecular & Computational biology
May 26, 2026
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13
More than half of Europe's soils are degraded. Researchers are showing that restoring soil through better farming makes both ecological and financial sense.
Agriculture
May 25, 2026
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17
Seeds like wheat, rice, and corn are at the center of the global food supply and provide most of the daily calories consumed worldwide. But despite their importance, scientists still do not fully understand many of the basic ...
Molecular & Computational biology
May 21, 2026
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13
Over the past decade, cities around the world have increasingly turned to nature-based infrastructure to become more resilient in the face of a changing climate. Urban forests provide shade during heat waves and improve air ...
Evolution
May 15, 2026
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39
Rice plants and Venus flytraps share something in common that was not scientifically documented until recently. Using a faint smell to lure caterpillars into a trap, rice plants killed early-stage fall armyworm larvae by ...
Ecology
May 13, 2026
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