In a new study published in Communications Biology, a team of researchers redescribe Palaeocampa anthrax as the first known nonmarine lobopodian, and the youngest ever discovered. The fossil, which predates the famous Burgess Shale lobopodians by nearly fifty years, is the earliest recorded and offers new light on the evolutionary survival strategies within the group.

How do trees regrow roots after being cut? A new study sheds light on this question using cutting-edge spatial transcriptomics to track how poplar stems regenerate roots. 

Scientists at the Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, have completed the largest taxonomic and genomic investigation yet of the bellflower genus Adenophora. By mining 9.89 TB of deep genome skimming data—nearly every known species in the group—they have clarified how hybridisation and gene flow shaped this lineage and, in turn, propose a new generic framework.

Researchers installed coloured concrete panels on Sydney Harbour seawalls to test whether red, yellow, green and grey surfaces attract different marine life. The year-long experiment revealed surprising differences in which species chose each colour.

Recently, a team from the Zhang lab at Shanghai Jiao Tong University published an article "High-throughput quantitative assessment of ABA-responsive elements at single-nucleotide resolution " in the journal Quantitative Biology. Using synthetic STARR-seq to quantitatively assess the effects of single-nucleotide substitutions on ABRE activity, they found that the nucleotide substitutions in both the ACGT-core and ACGT-flank regions affected transcriptional strength.