Category: Uncategorized
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Sun fleck
In deep forest understorey, often no more than 1 – 5% of the sunlight available in the canopy reaches leaves. Absorption and reflection by taller plants prevent shorter plants from capturing much of this valuable resource. Without light, there is no carbon gain – and without carbon gain, no growth, or reproduction. What’s a plant…
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A world without mosquitoes
This is a very small orchid I had the good fortune to see while working in Costa Rica earlier this year. The full scale on the image is no more than an inch – you are looking at a very very small flower! Do you like it? You’ll be dismayed, then, to find out that…
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How to measure CO2 flux
How do we actually measure gas (carbon dioxide, water) flux for a plant, an animal, or an ecosystem? The answer relies on something called an IRGA, or an infrared gas analyzer. Different molecules absorb certain wavelengths of light. That means that if we shine the right kind of light on some molecule, we can measure…
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Layers of diversity
Leaves emerge through the fog as we drive through cloud forest. Visibility is no more than a few meters, and the road is mud beneath our wheels. The change is remarkable – just a few hours earlier we were in the sunny and sticky warmth of a moist tropical forest. It’s amazing how quickly plant…