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1. Radio frequency plasma capacitor can increase rates of seeds imbibition, germination, and radicle growth

   https://doi.org/10.1071/FP20293  

   Volkov, Alexander G. ; Bookal, Asya ; Hairston, Jewel S. ; Patel, Darayas ( January 2020 , Functional Plant Biology)

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2. Seeds don’t sink: even massive black hole ‘seeds’ cannot migrate to galaxy centres efficiently

   https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stab2713  

   Ma, Linhao ; Hopkins, Philip F ; Ma, Xiangcheng ; Anglés-Alcázar, Daniel ; Faucher-Giguère, Claude-André ; Kelley, Luke Zoltan ( October 2021 , Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society)

   ABSTRACT Possible formation scenarios of supermassive black holes (BHs) in the early universe include rapid growth from less massive seed BHs via super-Eddington accretion or runaway mergers, yet both of these scenarios would require seed BHs to efficiently sink to and be trapped in the Galactic Centre via dynamical friction. This may not be true for their complicated dynamics in clumpy high-z galaxies. In this work, we study this ‘sinking problem’ with state-of-the-art high-resolution cosmological simulations, combined with both direct N-body integration of seed BH trajectories and post-processing of randomly generated test particles with a newly developed dynamical friction estimator. We find that seed BHs less massive than $10^8\, \mathrm{M}_\odot$ (i.e. all but the already-supermassive seeds) cannot efficiently sink in typical high-z galaxies. We also discuss two possible solutions: dramatically increasing the number of seeds such that one seed can end up trapped in the Galactic Centre by chance, or seed BHs being embedded in dense structures (e.g. star clusters) with effective masses above the mass threshold. We discuss the limitations of both solutions. 

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3. Diversity of seeds captured by interception exceeds diversity of seeds deposited in traps

   https://doi.org/10.1111/btp.12419  

   Stone, Judy L. ; Malloy, Ryan ; Murray, Greg ( May 2017 , Biotropica)
4. Phospholipase Dα1-mediated phosphatidic acid change is a key determinant of desiccation-induced viability loss in seeds: PA modulates desiccation sensitivity in seeds

   https://doi.org/10.1111/pce.12925  

   Chen, Hongying ; Yu, Xiaomei ; Zhang, Xudong ; Yang, Lan ; Huang, Xing ; Zhang, Jie ; Pritchard, Hugh W. ; Li, Weiqi ( January 2018 , Plant, Cell & Environment)
5. Resurrected seeds from herbarium specimens reveal rapid evolution of drought resistance in a selfing annual

   https://doi.org/10.1002/ajb2.16265  

   Christie, Kyle ; Pierson, Natalie R. ; Holeski, Liza M. ; Lowry, David B. ( December 2023 , American Journal of Botany)

   Increased aridity and drought associated with climate change are exerting unprecedented selection pressures on plant populations. Whether populations can rapidly adapt, and which life history traits might confer increased fitness under drought, remain outstanding questions.

   We utilized a resurrection ecology approach, leveraging dormant seeds from herbarium collections to assess whether populations ofPlantago patagonicafrom the semi‐arid Colorado Plateau have rapidly evolved in response to approximately ten years of intense drought in the region. We quantified multiple traits associated with drought escape and drought resistance and assessed the survival of ancestors and descendants under simulated drought.

   Descendant populations displayed a significant shift in resource allocation, in which they invested less in reproductive tissues and relatively more in both above‐ and below‐ground vegetative tissues. Plants with greater leaf biomass survived longer under terminal drought; moreover, even after accounting for the effect of increased leaf biomass, descendant seedlings survived drought longer than their ancestors.

   Our results document rapid adaptive evolution in response to climate change in a selfing annual and suggest that shifts in tissue allocation strategies may underlie adaptive responses to drought in arid or semi‐arid environments. This work also illustrates a novel approach, documenting that under specific circumstances, seeds from herbarium specimens may provide an untapped source of dormant propagules for future resurrection experiments.

    

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