Yunnan University

Re-establishing plantings of trees, grasses and other vegetation is essential for restoring degraded ecosystems, but a new survey of almost 2,600 restoration projects from nearly every type of ecosystem on Earth finds that most projects fail to recognize and control one of the new plants' chief threats: hungry critters that eat plants. Re-establishing plantings of trees, grasses and other vegetation is essential for restoring degraded ecosystems, but a new survey of almost 2,600 restoration projects from nearly every type of ecosystem on Earth finds that most projects fail to recognize and control one of the new plants' chief threats: hungry critters that eat plants. "While most of the projects took steps to exclude competing plant species, only 10% took steps to control or temporarily exclude herbivores, despite the fact that in the early stages these plants are like lollipops -- irresistible little treats for grazers," said Brian Silliman, Rachel Carson Distinguished Professor of Marine Conservation Biology at Duke University's Nicholas School of the Environment. By not protecting plants in their early states, conservationists are missing out on great opportunity to significantly speed restoration, improve its outcomes, and lower its costs, he said. "Our analysis of the surveyed projects shows that introducing predators to keep herbivore populations in check or installing barriers to keep them at bay until plantings become more established and less vulnerable, can increase plant re-growth by 89% on average," said Silliman, who helped conceptualize the study and was one of its coauthors. Those gains are equal to or greater than the gains realized by excluding competing plant species, the new survey shows. "This begs the question: Why aren't we doing it more?" he asks. The new survey was conducted with input from an international team of researchers affiliated with 20 universities and institutions. They published their peer-reviewed findings Nov. 3 in Science. Qiang He, professor of coastal ecology at Fudan University and a former postdoctoral research associate of Silliman's at Duke, co-led the study with Changlin Xu, a member of He's Coastal Ecology Lab at Fudan. The survey's findings have far-reaching implications for efforts to restore vegetation at a time of climate change, He said. "Herbivores' effects were particularly pronounced in regions with higher temperatures and lower precipitation," He noted. All of which leads to one inescapable conclusion, Silliman said. "If we want more plants, we have to let more predators in or restore their populations," Silliman said. "Indeed, the decline of large predators, like wolves, lions, and sharks, that normally keep herbivore populations in check, is likely an important indirect cause of high grazing pressures." "Conventional restoration is slowing our losses, but it's not expanding vegetation in many places, and climate change could make that even more difficult," he said. Using predators to keep herbivores in check at restored sites is a relatively untapped approach that could help us boost plant diversity and restore ecosystems that are vital to human and environmental health, in less time and at lower costs," Silliman said. "It's like learning a new gardening trick that doubles your yield." Once a planting is established, the herbivores are essential too, he added. "Plants just need a small break from being eaten to get restarted making ecosystems. Once they establish, herbivores are key to maintaining plant ecosystem diversity and function." Researchers from the University of Canterbury (N.Z.); Aarhus University; Northeastern University; Pusan National University; the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center; the University of Maryland; the Instituto de Investigaciones Marinas y Costeras; and Sonoma State University coauthored the study with the Duke and Fudan scientists. Coauthors also came from Northern Illinois University; East China Normal University; Peking University; Nanjing University; the University of Florida; the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research; the University of Groningen; the Chinese Academy of Sciences; Lanzhou University; and Yunnan University. Primary funding was provided by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (#32271601) and the National Key Basic Research Program (#2022YFC2601100 and 2022YFC3105402).

Buckwheat's high-precision chromosomal-level genome sequence has been deciphered, a key step toward unraveling the evolution of the buckwheat genome and the origins of the cultivated crop. By altering specific genes using a method independent of common genome-editing techniques, the researchers successfully developed a self-fertile buckwheat variety as well as a new type of the crop with a sticky, mochi-like texture. This breeding method may contribute to a more diverse range of orphan crops than what is possible with existing genome editing technologies. A research group led by Kyoto University's Graduate School of Agriculture has deciphered buckwheat's high-precision chromosomal-level genome sequence, a key step toward unraveling the evolution of the buckwheat genome and the origins of the cultivated crop. By altering specific genes using a method independent of common genome-editing techniques, the researchers successfully developed a self-fertile buckwheat variety as well as a new type of the crop with a sticky, mochi-like texture. This breeding method may contribute to a more diverse range of orphan crops than what is possible with existing genome editing technologies. With the world's population predicted to reach 9.7 billion by 2050, increasing dependence on three major grain crops -- rice, wheat, and corn -- has raised interest in less-common orphan crops. Deciphering these crop genomes using next-generation sequencing technologies may promote their efficient breeding, representing a crucial step toward achieving the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals of 'Zero Hunger', 'Good Health and Well-Being', and 'Responsible Consumption and Production'. The international research team that made these findings is,led by Yasuo Yasui from the Graduate School of Agriculture at Kyoto University, includes RIKEN, Japan's National Agriculture and Food Research Organization, Chiba University, Kyoto Prefectural University, Kazusa DNA Research Institute, The Graduate University for Advanced Studies or SOKENDAI, Yunnan Agricultural University, and the University of Cambridge.

Did the pterosaurs, flying reptiles from the days of the dinosaurs, practice parental care or not? New research shows that pterosaurs were indeed caring parents -- but only the larger species. Did the pterosaurs, flying reptiles from the days of the dinosaurs, practice parental care or not? New research by scientists from Ireland (University College Cork), China (Nanjing and Yunnan Universities) and the UK (University of Bristol and Queen Mary University of London) shows that pterosaurs were indeed caring parents -- but only the larger species. This solves a long-standing conundrum. To be able to fly soon after hatching from the egg, a bird or pterosaur must have well-developed wings. Studies of smaller pterosaurs from the Jurassic showed that their babies already had large wings when they hatched and they could have wobbled into flight within a few days of birth. But did this work for the later pterosaurs which were much larger in size? In the Cretaceous, pterosaurs usually had wingspans of 5 metres, and some even reached 10-15 metres, the size of a small glider. "This was a difficult project," says the study leader, Dr Zixiao Yang from University College Cork (UCC). 'We needed examples of pterosaurs where we had at least one hatchling or very young specimen as well as adults so we could study their growth rates. But baby pterosaurs are really rare." Dr Yang collaborated with Professor Baoyu Jiang from Nanjing University, Professor Michael Benton of University of Bristol, Professor Xu Xing of Yunnan University, and Professor Maria McNamara of UCC on the research. "Luckily, we were able to use some classic specimens from the Jurassic of Europe and the Cretaceous of North America, together with new finds from China. By measuring the skulls, backbones, wings, and hind legs, we were able to test for differences in the relative growth of different parts of the body." The research focussed on testing the allometry, or how the creatures' characteristics changed with size. "We are all familiar with allometry in human babies, puppies and kittens -- their heads, eyes and knees are huge, and the rest of the body grows faster to get to adult proportions. It's the same with many animals, including dinosaurs and pterosaurs. The babies have cute faces, with short noses, big eyes, and big heads," Dr Yang said. "The small, bird-sized, Jurassic pterosaurs were born with large wings and strong arms and legs, evidence that the babies could fly from birth. As they grew from baby to adult, their arms and legs showed negative allometry, meaning they started large and were then growing more slowly than the rest of the body." "But it was different for the Cretaceous giants. They also started as small babies, but the key limb bones show positive allometry through growth, suggesting a very different developmental model." "This means that the pterosaur giants had sacrificed low-input childcare to the need to grow huge eventually as adults. Minimal childcare makes sense in the early evolutionary history of these ancient reptiles because it saves energy. But to grow huge, the larger pterosaurs had a problem -- it basically took much longer to become an adult, and therefore parents needed to protect their young from accidents. The babies of all pterosaurs, large and small, were small because of the limitations of egg size. Investing in childcare by having non-flying babies was offset in evolutionary terms by allowing pterosaurs to evolve truly huge sizes." "We see the same thing in birds and mammals today. Some birds fly very young, and of course some mammals like cattle and antelopes are on their feet the day they are born. But this kind of behaviour is risky for the babies because they are often clumsy and are easy targets for predators; it's costly also for the mother because the babies must have highly developed wings or legs at the point of birth. So, we see the same thing in extinct pterosaurs. They were restricted in maximum body size until the end of the Jurassic, at which point their parental care behaviour changed, and then they could achieve huge sizes."