Cassava makes up nearly 50 percent of the diet in parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, where populations are projected to increase by more than 120% in the next 30 years. With stagnant yields for the last half century, scientists realize the need to focus their efforts on this crop, which is particularly valuable for rural smallholder farmers.

A prestigious Tansley Review, published in New Phyt...

In the last decade, more than half of all forest elephants have been slaughtered for their market-precious ivory. Without action, this species will go extinct within our lifetime.

But it’s hard to garner support for a species many do not know exists. Today the U.S. government and several conservation groups fail to recognize the forest elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis) as a distinct species...

Throughout the growing season seemingly benign clouds pass over millions of acres of crops, causing rapid fluctuations in light intensity and inadvertently robbing these plants of their productivity--this costs us untold bushels of potential yield. In a recent study, researchers used a rapid screening technique that genetically engineers plants--in real time--to investigate how to help...

Imagine—instead of acres of oil wells on barren land—endless fields of towering green sugarcane, with each stalk producing renewable and sustainable biofuel.

The University of Illinois and the University of Florida have been awarded a third round of funding from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) to realize ultra-productive biofuel crops.

PE...

The University of Illinois and University of Puerto Rico have completely sequenced the mitochondrial genome for the Hispaniolan solenodon, filling in the last major branch of placental mammals on the tree of life.

The study, published in Mitochondrial DNA, confirmed that the venomous mammal diverged from all other living mammals 78 million years ago, long before an asteroid wiped out th...