The tires on our Jeep barely grip the twin strips of overgrown asphalt. I catch myself asking the battered skid plates underneath to forgive my fondness for potholes. But there is hardly any room for evasion. On our left is an impenetrable green wall of trees, ferns, tree-ferns, and moss. To the right, a truncated grass verge reminds us of the shear 2,000 ft. plunge to the valley below. Rising fog obscures the ledge—and my anxiety.
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Murder Mystery: When the Witness is a Tree
If a tree is witness to a murder, a translator is needed to get its testimony. Enter Alex Wiedenhoeft, Forest Products Laboratory (FPL) Research Botanist and Team Leader in the Center for Wood Anatomy Research (CWAR).
Chair’s message to alumni
Dear alumni, This has been a challenging year for our department and across all of higher education, but the “safer at home” directive that forced us to complete the Spring 2020 semester via remote teaching …
Lifelike chemistry created in lab search for ways to study origin of life
Research in the Baum Lab shows that simple laboratory techniques can spur the kinds of reactions that are likely necessary to explain how life got started on Earth some four billion years ago.
Beautiful wonder
For botanist Ken Cameron, orchids fascinate as well as inspire him to further research in plant evolution and biodiversity.
Lofty Goals
Botany grad student Evan Eifler rediscovers Geissorhiza esterhuyseniae in the remote peaks of South Africa.
Arboretum Research Fellowship Recipients Announced
Congratulations to Botany PhD candidates Jared Beck and Rachel Jordan who were recently announced recipients of the Arboretum Research Fellowships! They will receive one year of support and access to Arboretum land and resources.
Seeing things more clearly, thanks to campus-wide microscopy effort
Thanks to the efforts of several University of Wisconsin–Madison researchers (including Marisa Otegui) and funding from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), UW–Madison scientists will soon have a cutting-edge new TEM.
‘Foray’ draws scientists to Wisconsin in search of mushrooms, fellowship
Now in its 44th year, the Smith Lake States Mycological Foray gathers mushroom experts to collect samples, share mycological gossip and debate the evolution of these enigmatic organisms.
In dangerous fungal family’s befriending of plants, a story of loss
Researchers show that gene loss — not the evolution of new genes — helped drive the fly amanita mushroom into its symbiotic relationship with plants.