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GMOnstera? Would you keep a GMO houseplant?*

*If it actually helped reduce air pollutants?

There’s a lot of talk on the internet about the ability of certain houseplants to clean ‘toxins’ out of the air. Take a deep dive into Pinterest, and you’ll see hundreds of pictures suggesting the best ‘pollutant purifier plants’. Unfortunately, so far, the scientific evidence for our chlorophyllous friends actually cleaning is pretty scant. But what if plants could be genetically modified to improve them in this manner?… Read more

Your name is not on the list

Plants can’t really choose whose pollen they get covered with. All kinds of pollinators bring all kinds of pollen to the party. And with it they bring the burden, to the plant, of figuring out which pollen to allow in and which to send away. But as it turns out, plants know just which molecular bouncers to use, to keep the party going.… Read more

Variegated plants mix it up

Most people use instagram to follow celebs and look at highly staged photos of people enjoying their morning cup of cold brew on top of mountain in their underwear at sunset. Us plant nerds, however, like to look at plants.

And if you’re anything like us, you might have noticed a trend – marbled monstera plants, fancy ficuses with white borders, and pale or patterned philodendrons. These diverse beauties are out to show that being different from the other plants only makes them more fascinating.… Read more

Plants v. lasers: remarkable root regeneration

Plants are better than you.

They’re better at fixing carbon (hello photosynthesis). They’re better at attracting bees. They’re generally just a whole lot prettier than you, even this guy And, relevant for today’s post, they’re better than you at surviving laser attacks… providing that the lasers only damage a few cells at a time, and the plants get given a somewhat long time to recover between each shot.… Read more

Where are our GM superfoods?

With the idea of genetically modified (GM) crops, we the public were promised amazing new products. Healthier, tastier and better plant based foods to fill our plates. But now, it’s been over 30 years since people first proposed to use genetic engineering in plant breeding, and our plates mostly contain the same plant products as before.

What happened?… Read more