Image by Smileus, licensed via Adobe Stock (Education License)

Plants are remarkably good at adjusting how they capture sunlight and produce food through photosynthesis. A new computer model helps scientists better understand these adjustments by looking at what happens at different heights within a plant canopy, from the sun-drenched leaves at the top to the shaded leaves near the ground.

Chi Chen, assistant professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources, and affiliate of the Rutgers Climate and Energy Institute, is the author of the study.

The research, published in the Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems, introduces a model called GMC-OPT (Global Multilayer Canopy OPTimization) that tracks how plants adjust their photosynthesis hour by hour and season by season. Unlike simpler models that treat an entire forest or field as one big leaf, this model considers how conditions change at different heights. Leaves at the top receive intense sunlight but risk damage, while lower leaves get less light and are more limited by energy availability. 

The model reveals several interesting patterns. First, the best time for leaves to maximize photosynthesis is not always at solar noon when sunlight is strongest. Upper canopy leaves actually perform best in the morning, before the sun becomes too intense, the environment becomes too dry, and conditions become potentially harmful to photosynthesis. Second, beyond instantaneous stomatal regulation, leaves adjust their photosynthetic capacity based on their position in the canopy at seasonal scales – called photosynthetic acclimation. The relationship between light and acclimated leaf photosynthetic capacity is not simply a straight line. Upper leaves can become saturated with too much light and other stresses, while lower leaves respond more efficiently to the light they receive.

The model also discovered that different types of vegetation manage their leaves differently through the seasons. Tree-dominated forests like evergreen and mixed forests prioritize keeping their upper, light-gathering leaves healthy. In contrast, grasslands and deciduous forests replace leaves more uniformly throughout the canopy. This helps explain why different ecosystems respond differently to seasonal changes and why forests and grasslands have distinct growth patterns.

Understanding these patterns has important implications for climate science. Photosynthesis is the largest carbon flux on land, meaning plants absorb enormous amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Better models of photosynthesis help scientists predict how ecosystems will respond to climate change, increasing temperatures, and rising carbon dioxide levels. They also help farmers and land managers understand how plants use water and nutrients, which is crucial for sustainable agriculture and water management.

“By understanding how plants optimize photosynthesis at different levels of the canopy and across different timescales, we can better predict how ecosystems will respond to environmental changes. This knowledge is essential for managing our forests, crops, and natural areas in a way that maximizes carbon capture while conserving water and nutrients,” said Chen.

The model was tested against data from 119 monitoring stations worldwide and accurately predicted carbon uptake at hourly to annual scales. While the model is complex, requiring detailed information about canopy structure and radiation, it provides insights that simpler models cannot. As satellite technology improves, scientists will be able to gather the detailed vertical structure information needed to apply this model globally, leading to better predictions of how vegetation affects our climate. Read the full study here.

This article was written with assistance from Artificial Intelligence, was reviewed and edited by Oliver Stringham, and was reviewed and edited by Chi Chen, the author of the study.

 

L-R: Frances Wood (UKRI), and collaborators Bruce Greive (U Manchester), Siobain Duffy (Rutgers), Linda Hanley-Bowdoin (North Carolina State U), Hujun Yin (U Manchester), Jose Trino Ascencio-Ibáñez (NCSU), Vasthi Alonso-Chavez (Rothamsted Research) pictured at the Pioneering UK–US Breakthroughs (PUB) Award event on March 4, 2026. Photo credit: Thomas Pospiech – UKRI North America Thomas.Pospiech@ukri.org

At a reception hosted at the British Embassy in Washington, D.C. on March 4, Professor Siobain Duffy and her international research team were recognized with the Pioneering UK–US Breakthroughs (PUB) Award, a distinction honoring seven collaborative teams whose work is addressing some of the world’s most urgent challenges.

Presented by His Majesty’s Ambassador to the United States, Sir Christian Turner, and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) International Director Frances Wood, the award highlights the global impact of cross-border scientific partnerships. Duffy, professor and chair of the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources, was part of one of the seven selected teams, recognized for pioneering a transformative technology to detect crop vi

Duffy serves as principal investigator on the NSF-BBSRC-funded project, “US-UK Collab: Resurrecting a role for roguing: Presymptomatic detection with multispectral imaging to quantify and control the transmission of cassava brown streak disease.” The research introduces a novel multispectral imaging device capable of detecting viral infections in crops earlier, faster, and more cost-effectively than traditional genetic testing.

Genetic analysis of cassava brown streak disease root necrosis using image analysis and genome-wide association studies. Copyright © 2024 Nandudu, Strock, Ogbonna, Kawuki and Jannink.

“This award reflects the strength of international collaboration in tackling complex global problems,” said Duffy. “By bringing together expertise across disciplines and continents, we are developing tools that can make a real difference for farmers and food systems worldwide.”

At the center of the team’s work is cassava brown streak disease, a devastating viral infection threatening cassava crops across sub-Saharan Africa. Cassava, a staple food for hundreds of millions of people, is also gaining traction globally as a climate-resilient alternative to wheat because it requires less water and can survive in harsher conditions.

The challenge, Duffy explains, is that the disease often goes undetected until it is too late. “The symptoms of the disease are often so subtle on the above-ground parts of the plant that farmers do not know their fields are infected,” she said. “The disease spreads throughout the growing season, and when the roots are harvested, they are full of necrotic lesions.”

To address this, the team has developed a cutting-edge multispectral imaging system that scans cassava leaves using wavelengths beyond the visible spectrum. Combined with machine learning models, the device can identify infected plants before visible symptoms appear—and even earlier than conventional molecular diagnostics.

“Our team has developed a multi-spectral imager that scans cassava leaves with many wavelengths of light,” Duffy explained. “Extensive training has yielded machine learning models that can detect diseased plants earlier than molecular tests, and much earlier than slight symptoms develop.” Early detection enables farmers to remove infected plants before the disease spreads. “If we had a better way to detect which plants were infected earlier in the season, then farmers could ‘rogue’ the diseased plants and prevent further spread of the disease,” she added.

A new device for field-testing crops for Cassava Mosaic and Brown Streak disease. Photo courtesy of UKRI.

The project brings together a highly interdisciplinary team spanning institutions in the United States, the United Kingdom, and East Africa, including molecular virologists, evolutionary biologists, engineers and AI specialists, mathematical modelers, and field-based researchers working directly with farming communities. Field testing of the imaging device is currently underway in Tanzania, where the team is evaluating its effectiveness in real-world conditions.

Looking ahead, Duffy notes that if the technology proves successful, the team plans to partner with Tanzania’s clean seed system to ensure that certified cassava planting material is free of the disease.

The broader implications of the research are significant. By enabling earlier detection and containment of plant viruses, the technology has the potential to reduce crop loss, boost yields, and decrease reliance on expensive laboratory diagnostics. In doing so, it supports local livelihoods, strengthens rural economies, and contributes to more resilient global food systems.

“This technology can help safeguard food security,” said Duffy, underscoring its importance for regions where cassava is a dietary and economic cornerstone.

Funded jointly by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council through the Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Disease Program, the project exemplifies how international collaboration can drive innovation with meaningful, far-reaching impact.

 

New research has shown a way to easily differentiate healthy guts from unhealthy guts headed toward disease.

Scientists have identified a new way to distinguish healthy guts from diseased ones and track how some illnesses progress by measuring how gut bacteria interact with one another.

According to a study published in Science, a Rutgers-led team of scientists found that healthy and diseased digestive systems behave like two distinct ecological states, driven not by individual microbes but by how entire bacterial communities compete and cooperate.

“Instead of asking which bacteria are there, we started asking how they are related to other bacteria,” said Juan Bonachela, an assistant professor with the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Natural Resources at the Rutgers School of Environmental and Biological Sciences and a senior author of the study. “That change in perspective allowed us to see health and disease as two fundamentally different states of the gut microbiome.”

To measure how bacterial communities shift between health and disease, the team developed a new metric called the Ecological Network Balance Index, or ENBI, which captures whether microbial communities are dominated by competitive or cooperative interactions.

Applied to stool samples, ENBI consistently separated healthy individuals from patients across multiple diseases. In colorectal cancer, the index rose as the disease progressed.

“This new measure captures this shift using stool samples and can distinguish healthy people from diseased people,” said Maria Gloria Dominguez-Bello, the Henry Rutgers Professor of Microbiome and Health in the Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology at the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences and an author of the study. 

Rod-shaped bacteria and spherical cocci, shown here in contrasting colors, represent different microbes that share the gut’s complex ecosystem. Scientists have found that shifts in how these microbes compete and cooperate can signal the difference between health and disease. Graphic: Xuesong Zhang/Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine

Dominguez-Bello said the findings show how disease emerges when microbial communities reorganize themselves.

“This work shows that gut health is not just about which bacteria are present, but how they interact with one another,” she said. “In diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease, C. difficile infection, irritable bowel syndrome and colorectal cancer, bacteria form more cooperative, tightly connected groups that can dominate and disrupt normal function.”

Martin Blaser, an author of the study and director of Rutgers Health’s Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine, said the findings help explain why so many gut-related diseases have been difficult to predict and treat.

“This gives us a new way to think about what goes wrong in the microbiome,” Blaser said. “Instead of focusing on individual microbes, it shows that disease emerges when the entire system shifts. That opens the door to earlier detection and more targeted interventions.”

The team started their research by building computer models that simulate how gut bacteria compete for nutrients and exchange metabolic byproducts.

“At first we were just testing whether the model could reproduce basic features of real microbiomes,” said Roberto Corral Lopez, the study’s lead author, who conducted the research as a Fulbright doctoral scholar at Rutgers and now is a postdoctoral associate at the Universidad de Granada and the Instituto Carlos I de Física Teórica y Computacional in Spain. “But very early on, we saw that it naturally produced two distinct patterns, one that looked like health and one that looked like disease.”

That prompted the researchers to compare their simulations with stool DNA data from patients.

“When we checked the data, we saw the same pattern,” Corral Lopez said. “That’s when we realized we were capturing something fundamental about how these communities reorganize in disease.”

The gut microbiome consistently settled into one of two configurations: a diverse, competitive state associated with health, and a second state dominated by small, tightly connected groups of cooperating bacteria linked to disease.

Bonachela said the insights and the tool could eventually help doctors identify problems earlier.

“In theory, it should be possible to measure it from just stool samples, which is a very non-invasive way to monitor gut health,” he said.

The findings also may help explain why gut therapies such as probiotics and fecal microbiota transplants sometimes succeed and sometimes fail.

“Treatments are typically based on the idea that you need particular bacteria to be there,” Bonachela said. “But if that is not the issue, if the issue is the relationships, then it does not matter that you give the bacteria.”

With fecal transplants, he said, the benefit may come not from introducing individual species, but from restoring entire microbial communities.

“The interesting aspect is not that you introduce the species,” Bonachela said. “It is that you introduce a whole community, and therefore you are keeping the interactions that allow that community to be healthy. It is not that bacteria need to be there. They need to be there with the right partners.”

Corral Lopez said the work eventually could make microbiome-based therapies more predictable.

“Right now, donor selection is largely based on availability and basic health screening,” said Corral Lopez, referring to the process preceding fecal transplants. “What this opens up is the possibility of matching microbial communities based on how their interaction networks fit together, rather than just which species are present. That could help us design treatments that are tailored to each patient’s microbiome instead of relying on trial and error.”

Bonachela said the team hopes their work will eventually lead to earlier detection and more personalized care.

“We are trying to understand how these systems work so we can make a real difference in people’s lives,” he said.

Michael Manhart of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School contributed to the study. Other contributors include Simon Levin of Princeton University and Miguel Munoz of the Universidad de Granada.

This article originally appeared in Rutgers Today.

 

Allyson Salisbury teaches several tree-related courses that incorporate hands-on activities and getting outside. Photo credit: Roslyn Dvorin.

Allyson Salisbury, assistant teaching professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources at Rutgers University-New Brunswick, is the recipient of the 2025 International Society of Arboriculture (ISA) Early-Career Scientist Award. This Award of Distinction recognizes an individual who shows exceptional promise, with high potential to become an internationally recognized scientist.

The ISA Awards of Distinction are the highest honors given by ISA based on nominations submitted by members and industry professionals. Recipients were announced at the ISA Annual International Conference, which was held from 19-22 October in Christchurch, New Zealand.

“The Early-Career Scientist Award is designed to recognize those making a difference right from the start,” said ISA CEO and executive director Caitlyn Pollihan. “While success and impact can occur at any point in a career, we want to honor those making an impact early in their journey, which is why we are excited to present this award to Allyson Salisbury.”

As an assistant teaching professor at Rutgers, Salisbury teaches an introductory course called Trees and the Environment, as well as Arboriculture, Silviculture and Urban Forestry. In addition to teaching, she studies how to help trees and other plants thrive in towns and cities.

Before joining the Rutgers faculty, Salisbury worked as a remote researcher for the University of Florida and Temple University. Salisbury completed her master’s and Ph.D. in environmental science at Rutgers-New Brunswick and her bachelor’s degree in Earth and environmental science at Susquehanna University.

She worked as a post-doc at The Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Illinois, and in the Holzapfel Lab at Rutgers-Newark. Additionally, she worked as a graduate mentor in the Douglass Project for Women in Math, Science and Engineering at Rutgers.

ABOUT ISA
The International Society of Arboriculture (ISA), headquartered in Atlanta, Ga., U.S., is a nonprofit professional organization dedicated to promoting the importance of arboriculture and educating the public about the significance of trees and the value of their proper care. As part of ISA’s advancing the arboriculture profession, it offers the only internationally recognized certification program in the industry, including ISA Certified Arborist ®. For more information about ISA and Certified Arborists, visit www.isa-arbor.com.

 

Photo credit: Rachael Winfree.

A new study has challenged a long-held belief in ecology: that a bee’s body size determines how far it travels and, in turn, how much land around it matters. The authors of the study, published in Ecography, tested this idea—called the “mobility hypothesis”—by analyzing 84 species of wild bees across 165 sites in the northeastern U.S. What they found was surprising: body size didn’t predict how much land a bee responds to. Instead, when a bee is active—its phenology—is a better clue to where it’s found.

Rachael Winfree, an affiliate of the Rutgers Climate and Energy Institute and professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Natural Resources, is the senior author on the study. She and her colleagues found that spring-flying bees are more likely to be associated with forests, while bees active in summer prefer open, sunny habitats like meadows or farmland. This pattern reflects where flowers bloom: forests bloom earlier in the year, while open spaces bloom later.

The research has important takeaways for conservation and land-use planning. Conservation efforts often focus on open meadows, especially in summer. But by doing so, we may be missing key species that depend on spring flowers in forests. Protecting a range of habitat types—including forests—is essential to supporting a full diversity of bees, which are vital for pollination and food systems.

“Ecologists often assume that larger animals need larger areas of habitat,” said Winfree. “But our findings show that we can’t make assumptions based on body size alone—we need to understand the natural history of the bee species. That’s how we’ll best protect pollinators and the ecosystems they support.”

By improving our understanding of how wild pollinators interact with land use, it can inform public policies that support biodiversity, sustainable agriculture, and regional planning in areas like New Jersey and beyond.

You can read the full study here.

This article was written with assistance from Artificial Intelligence, was reviewed and edited by Oliver Stringham, and was reviewed and edited by Rachael Winfree, senior author on the study.

 

Scientists are studying the interaction between humans and nature in urban landscapes.

A study by Rutgers ecologist Myla Aronson and colleagues has found “overwhelming” evidence that increasing biodiversity in cities – establishing parks, installing native plants and encouraging sustainable landscaping – can significantly improve human health.

Reporting in the science journal People and Nature, Aronson and coauthors described conducting a systematic review of more than 1,500 studies to synthesize their findings. They looked at how making cities greener and more friendly to plants and animals, an approach known as biodiversity-supporting actions, affects human health. They also examined linkages between biodiversity and people living in cities.

“We found overwhelming evidence that biodiversity is good for human health and well-being,” said Aronson, an assistant professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Natural Resources in the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences. “These actions also reduce exposure to environmental harms such as heat and pollution, including air, light and noise.”

Ecologist Myla Aronson is finding a positive connection between human health and increased biodiversity in urban areas. Courtesy of Myla Aronson.

The findings show actions designed to support biodiversity, such as planting native vegetation, creating large parks and reducing pesticide use, are linked to better physical and mental health, increased physical activity, improved childhood development and stronger social outcomes.

Aronson, who also is the director of the William L. Hutcheson Memorial Forest Center, a 500-acre preserve in Franklin, in Somerset County, has long studied the variety of life in that ecosystem. She also has studied how cities can support biodiversity. 

As scientists such as Aronson have provided increasing evidence that urban ecosystems can be planned and managed to support high levels of diversity, urban planners and policy makers have become increasingly interested in supporting and growing those ecosystems, she said.

But a question kept nagging at her: Is biodiversity actually good for people?

“As urban planners start to care about how parks and green spaces can support nature, we thought it would be important to know – does that biodiversity help the people who live there, too?” she said.

The study showed people benefit when cities include large parks, green corridors, native plants, wetlands and trees, and when they manage these spaces without harmful pesticides. “They breathe cleaner air, feel less stressed and build stronger social bonds,” Aronson said.

Scientists also identified in the review specific biodiversity-supporting elements that contribute to these benefits. These include green corridors that connect parks, diverse habitats within urban areas and the preservation of special resources such as large trees, wetlands and rivers.

“This is the first time that diverse literature has been compiled to show the large potential for co-benefits between human health and biodiversity conservation in cities,” Aronson said. “Designing and managing urban greenspaces for biodiversity will also be good for people.”

The research also noted some negative outcomes. Certain trees that release wind-dispersed pollen may increase allergies, and urban greening projects can sometimes lead to gentrification, raising property values and displacing long-time residents. This, she said, underscores the need for careful planning to avoid unintended consequences while maximizing the benefits of nature in urban environments.

The positives far outweigh the negatives, however, Aronson said.

The findings suggest that city planners and policymakers should consider biodiversity not only as an environmental goal but as a public health strategy, she said. The study emphasizes the need for careful planning to avoid unintended consequences while maximizing the benefits of nature in urban environments.

“We have shown there is a large potential for co-benefits for human health and biodiversity management,” Aronson said. “Planning cities for biodiversity conservation will also be good for people.”

Support for the project was provided with a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

This article first appeared in Rutgers Today.

 

Distinguished Professor Joanna Burger pictured with an egret during a field study in New Jersey. Photo: Courtesy of Joanna Burger.

The Rutgers University Board of Governors (BOG) voted today, June 17, to establish the Joanna Burger Endowed Legacy Professorship to support faculty in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources who are advancing the study of behavioral ecology in innovative and impactful ways.

This legacy professorship is the first for the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences (SEBS).  Legacy professorships, approved by the BOG in 2020, enable current, emeritus and retired faculty and their families to create an endowed professorship that pays tribute to their legacy.

For more than five decades, Burger has been a pioneering force in the field of behavioral ecology at Rutgers University. From her early post-doctoral work studying brown-hooded gulls in the remote pampas of Argentina to long-term field studies across New Jersey, her career has been defined by fearless exploration, scientific rigor and a deep commitment to understanding the natural world.

Now, her extraordinary legacy will live on through the Joanna Burger Endowed Legacy Professorship housed within SEBS.

“When I came to Rutgers in the early 1970s, there were few women in the sciences,” Burger recalled. “But I found a home here—an academic environment where I could teach, publish and follow the science wherever it led.”

That journey led her into marshes, bays and forests to study species ranging from fiddler crabs and pine snakes to migratory shorebirds and diamondback terrapins. Her fieldwork, often initiated with minimal funding and maximum curiosity, grew into some of the longest-running ecological studies in the country.

The Joanna Burger Endowed Legacy Professorship will provide support to faculty working in behavioral ecology—support that Burger knows from experience can be transformative.

“Understanding animal behavior is essential to conservation, management, and our broader coexistence with wildlife,” she said. “This professorship is about enabling research that might be a bit off the beaten path, or too new to attract traditional funding—but that has the potential to lead to important scientific breakthroughs.”

Equally important, the professorship brings recognition and visibility to the work of behavioral ecologists at Rutgers.

“Rutgers is a large institution, and it’s easy for individual disciplines to become siloed across campuses and departments,” Burger noted. “This can spotlight important work, foster connection among researchers, and build a stronger sense of academic community.”

Her generosity in establishing this endowment reflects a lifelong commitment to giving back—to the university that nurtured her career, to the students she mentored and to the future of science driven by curiosity and compassion.

Burger’s passion for behavioral ecology began early. Growing up on a farm, she spent her childhood tracking bird nests among the zucchini plants, watching gulls follow her father’s plow, and learning from her parents to appreciate both wildlife and wildflowers.

“Farm life taught me that you must care for the land and the creatures that live on it—and that hard work, when driven by passion, leads to both success and joy,” she said.

That ethic has defined her decades at Rutgers. As a researcher, mentor and trailblazer, Burger has inspired countless students and colleagues. With the establishment of the Joanna Burger Endowed Legacy Professorship, her influence will extend far into the future—supporting faculty who are driven to ask bold questions, pursue meaningful discoveries and shape the field of behavioral ecology for generations to come.

 

Botanist Lena Struwe in the Hilma af Klint’ exhibit, “What Stands Behind the Flowers,” at the Museum of Modern Art, showing 20th century herbarium sheets and Hilma af Klint’s notebooks and floras describing plants featured in the exhibit. Photo credit: Åke Struwe.

A year ago, Rutgers botanist Lena Struwe received a call from the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York asking her to participate in a research collaboration investigating a set of recently discovered botanical drawings by Hilma af Klint, the esteemed early 20th century artist from Sweden, whose oversized abstract paintings were hidden for many decades after her death.

The work by Struwe and MoMA on the botanical drawings would soon reveal unexpected aspects of af Klint’s scientific knowledge and the ways her early botanical experiences shaped some of her art.

Cover of Hilma af Klint: What Stands Behind the Flowers, published by The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2025.

The collection, titled Nature Studies and acquired by MoMA in 2022, is on display, for the first time, from May 11 through September 27 in the exhibition, Hilma af Klint: What Stands Behind the Flowers. The 46 botanical works featuring wildflowers, weeds and edible plants were painted by af Klint during the spring and summer of 1919 and 1920 at her studio outside Stockholm, Sweden. 

“When I went to MoMA in the spring of last year and saw these drawings for the first time. I was astonished. These are traditional botanical drawings of common plants but with an unknown and unique dimension,” says Struwe, director of the Chrysler Herbarium and professor who teaches botany, evolution and nature journaling at the Rutgers School of Environmental and Biological Sciences.

Struwe earned her doctoral degree in Systematic Botany from Stockholm University and grew up only 30 miles away from where Hilma af Klint made the drawings. “When I was a child, our family used to sail in the summers around the islands where af Klint had lived, but despite that it was more than 100 years after her birth in 1862, she was then still unknown as an ingenious artist.”

“I know all these plant species Hilma painted by heart; they are part of our Swedish culture and folklore. I’m so familiar with the landscapes Hilma lived in and the lives and features of these plants, from the first signs-of-spring bright yellow coltsfoot flowers to the unassuming sedges in the meadows.”

Many of the plants af Klint painted are present in northeastern United States as weeds, like dandelions, which happens to be one of Struwe’s current research subjects. 

“People have mostly focused on Hilma af Klint’s fantastic abstract art, but from our research we now know that she was a holistic person, and her paintings had deep spiritual meaning. We’ve discovered that, from an early age, she was educated in natural history, especially plants, and was taught by some of the foremost field botanists of the 1870s,” says Struwe.”

Field collecting tools of the type that Hilma af Klint might have used in the 1800s – a wooden herbarium plant press, a brass magnifier, and a vasculum, a metal transport box for transporting collected live plants. Photo credit: Susanne Ruemmele, 2024.

“I also discovered that Hilma has likely pressed plants as part of her classwork as a teenager and that she kept her school flora with handwritten notes until her death in 1944,” she adds.

When Johannes Lundberg, curator at Swedish Museum of Natural History’s herbarium, searched for fungi and plants collected by af Klint after an inquiry by Struwe, he discovered seven unknown scientific drawings of mushrooms made by af Klint in their archives of millions of natural history specimens. It is now clear that af Klint was not only an abstract painter, but also a skilled scientific illustrator, hired to make botanical drawings of fungi for a book that never was published. Specimens from a student herbarium made by a young Swedish woman from the same time and area as af Klint’s school years were also discovered by Struwe in the herbarium at University of Oslo, Norway. They are also now on display in the exhibit, through a special loan, likely being the first time ever scientifically collected plant specimens are showcased at MoMA.  

Through these botanical watercolor paintings, af Klint sought to reveal, in her words, “what stands behind the flowers,” reflecting her belief that studying nature uncovers truths about the world. Each botanical illustration of a species is paired with a diagram, all different and depicting the properties she perceived they had. Some examples are concentric circles, a pinwheel of primary colors, checkerboards of dots and bright arrows, or crosses sunken in the ground.

Hilma af Klint. Convallaria majalis (Lily of the Valley), Geum rivale (Water Avens), Polygala vulgaris (Common Milkwort). Sheet 11 from the portfolio Nature Studies. June 10–11, 1919. Watercolor, pencil, ink, and metallic paint on paper, 19 5/8 × 10 5/8 in. (49.9 × 27 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Committee on Drawings and Prints Fund and gift of Jack Shear, 2022.

“This exhibition and the research leading up to it have expanded our understanding of Hilma af Klint’s practice. This is an artist with a deep interest in the natural world. We have learned that her plant knowledge and formal and informal botanical experience has shaped her artistic vision,” says Jodi Hauptman, The Richard Roth Senior Curator, Department of Drawings and Prints, MoMA, and the curator of the exhibition.

Struwe’s discoveries are detailed in a chapter titled, The Botanical World of Hilma af Klint in the printed, well-illustrated exhibit catalogue, Hilma af Klint: What Stands Behind the Flowers that accompanies the exhibition, alongside af Klint’s drawings and unpublished writings at MoMA. The book also includes essays by the exhibition curator Jodi Hauptman; Ewa Lajer-Burcharth, the William Dorr Boardman Professor of Fine Arts in the Department of History of Art and Architecture at Harvard University; and MoMA Paper Conservator Laura Neufeld, which analyze the imagery, materiality, and artistic knowledge of these never-before-displayed botanical works by af Klint.

“I always tell my students, when you get an opportunity, don’t say no too quickly. Always explore unexpected opportunities because you don’t know where they might lead you,” says Struwe. “This started as a small consultation for MoMA and has blossomed into a fantastic collaboration and a new research field focused on Hilma af Klint’s botanical world.”

Struwe continues, “Sometimes serendipity and unexpected connections make you amazed, and in this project, we have had many of those gasps of astonishment. Not only did I grow up and knew Hilma’s flowers as part of a joint Swedish heritage, but we also discovered that my grandmother’s aunt, a teacher and amateur botanist, attended the same girl’s public school in Stockholm as af Klint in 1872.”

Coincidentally, Struwe picked up watercolor painting a few years ago and her work with MoMA has her thinking differently about the connection of art and science in her own life.

“Working with Hilma’s botanical art have made me think differently about colors, patterns and forms in both nature and art. Colors were really important to Hilma, and she used them so boldly in her diagrams. There is meaning to her colors and symbolic shapes that we haven’t discovered yet,” says Struwe. “There is still so much left to discover in her work, this is just a first scratch on the surface of her understanding and interpretation of the world around her, seen and unseen, scientific and spiritual.”

Struwe is both thrilled and a bit bemused that she has become the go-to expert on Hilma af Klint’s botanical world.

“I never expected my memories of wildflower meadows, well-used field guide floras, and long summer vacations help me in future scientific and art history endeavors in the United States. I want to continue to create bridges of shared knowledge and excitement between art and science.”

 

The Museu da Amazônia – MUSA, a patch of preserved rainforest in Manaus, Brazil, is 1.5 hours by river away from the XPRIZE Rainforest competition site. Scientists studied its rich biodiversity to guide them in their sampling mission. Photo credit: Anthony Vastano/Lockwood Lab.

Rutgers researchers shine in competition designed to produce rapid and autonomous technologies to identify vanishing species

The challenge posed by organizers of the XPRIZE Rainforest competition to the international scientific community was formidable.

Devise a way to document the biodiversity within a remote Amazonian rainforest without stepping foot within, they said. Design a tent-size, portable laboratory that includes miniature versions of the advanced equipment necessary to conduct rapid genetic analysis, they added. And, finally, they said, complete the field work, analysis and written summary – efforts that normally would take months – in 72 hours.

A group of Rutgers scientists, led by ecologist Julie Lockwood, met this challenge and has been recognized internationally for stellar efforts. As part of the Map of Life Rapid Assessments team led by Yale University, the researchers placed second in the global competition, according to an announcement by the XPRIZE Foundation. The nonprofit organization, which designs and manages public competitions to encourage technological developments, awarded the team $2 million out of a $10 million purse for its accomplishments.

We saw this as the chance of a lifetime. Julie Lockwood. Director, Rutgers Climate and Energy Institute

“It was thrilling to be involved in the XPRIZE competition, continually innovating and improving mobile environmental DNA tools that we just didn’t dream were possible, even a year ago,” said Anthony Vastano, a Laboratory Researcher in Lockwood’s lab. “To see the tools we created being showcased to a panel of expert judges from around the world was intense at times, but also exciting. In the end, we demonstrated what a small team of motivated people can accomplish over a short amount of time.”s

Rutgers scientists (from left) Anthony Vastano and Oliver Stringham, XPRIZE eDNA Judge Meredith Palmer and the Universidade Federal Do Amazonas’ Tomas Hrbek working at night in a field lab in the Amazonian jungle. Hrbek is preparing to load and run the portable DNA sequencer to generate millions of DNA reads from the eDNA samples collected earlier. Photo credit: XPRIZE Foundation.

The prize money will go toward existing and future efforts to scale up and refine the biodiversity rapid assessment technologies the team created for the competition.

“Our goal here at Rutgers is to make our eDNA sampling tools accessible and affordable to users of a variety of technical backgrounds,” said Lockwood, Director of the Rutgers Climate and Energy Institute. “This will allow our approach to be used in generating meaningful and useful biodiversity information, even in the most remote corners of the globe.”

Rutgers scientists were invited by ecologist Walter Jetz of Yale to join the team and compete for the prize in the fall of 2023 because of their expertise in a technique known as environmental DNA, or eDNA, said Lockwood, who heads the Rutgers Environmental DNA Lab. 

With eDNA, vestiges of DNA are collected from an environment – air, vegetation or water – and used to determine whether species are present in a given ecosystem. At the Rutgers lab, Lockwood and colleagues have pioneered the use of several new collection tools for forest environments.

A specially designed drone collects DNA samples from the air over the Brazilian rainforest. Photo credit: Anthony Vastano/Lockwood Lab.

“Walter saw the potential of our tools to transform what he and his team were doing for the competition, and for his efforts more broadly to rapidly catalog biodiversity from any forest, anywhere in the world,” said Lockwood, who also is a professor in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Natural Resources in the Rutgers School of Environmental and Biological Sciences. “We saw this as the chance of a lifetime.”

The group traveled to Manaus, located on the banks of the Rio Negro in northwestern Brazil, in July 2024 for the challenge. They surveyed a 250-acre tropical rainforest outside the city. Using drones equipped with special eDNA devices they designed, they collected DNA samples from the air, water and tree canopies and amassed genetic evidence of hundreds of species in the allotted 24-hour period. Altogether, the Map of Life Rapid Assessment team identified 5,000 individual animals and plants from 225 species.

“They said, ‘Go!’ and then you fly your drones for 24 hours, and then you have 48 hours to develop what they called ‘insights,’” said Vastano, who led the development of the drone sample collection techniques and the design of the DNA analysis process. “After that, you basically process the data and then write a report. Our report was over 200 pages. The whole experience was phenomenal.”

The team conducted the DNA analysis in 90-degree heat in an unair-conditioned classroom, using fans to keep the electronic equipment cool. They were compelled to close the windows at night to keep the jungle insects out. The lab contained all the necessary elements, including pipettes, a centrifuge, a laptop computer and a small DNA sequencer. Once the DNA samples were processed, they were identified through a comparison with DNA sequences of thousands of species of insects, fish, animals and plants housed in a digital library. The bioinformatics specialists on the team created a computing workaround to accomplish this vast processing task, normally calculated over the course of days on supercomputers.

Scientists in the winning effort , who put in long hours outdoors and in a field lab, included: (from left) Christopher Eddy, Mariel Vandegrift, Lesley de Souza, Sophie Picq, Anthony Vastano, Oliver Stringham, Nasrah Hamdan, and Tomas Hrbek. DeSouza and Picq are with the Chicago Field Museum and Hamdan and Hrbek are with the Universidade Federal Do Amazonas. Photo credit: XPRIZE Foundation.

The competition was designed to incentivize novel, creative solutions to help preserve the diversity of life found within the world’s rainforests, which are threatened by deforestation and climate change. 

“The challenges environmentalists face to do this includes documenting that species are present and where, and then following the fate of these species as local and global efforts progress toward saving rainforests,” Lockwood said. “One would think that simply observing species is not that hard, but most rainforest habitat is still very remote, and the sheer number of species present can overwhelm even the most intrepid biologist’s ability to record all that they see.”

Other Rutgers researchers on the team included Oliver Stringham, a research analyst with the Rutgers Climate and Energy Institute; Michael Allen, now a research consultant with Tsuga Biodiversity Insights; Mariel Vandegrift, now a research technician at Cornell University; and Christopher Eddy, a laboratory researcher in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Natural Resources.

Other collaborators on the team included scientists from Yale University, the Chicago Field Museum and the Universidade Federal Do Amazonas

The article first appeared in Rutgers Today.

 

Pattern of cropland-induced biophysical contribution on annual daily mean land surface temperature change (ΔTs,bio) averaged from 2001 to 2023.

The academic journal Nature Communications published new research this month authored by Chi Chen, assistant professor and faculty member in the Rutgers University Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Natural Resources.  

The paper, titled “Biophysical effects of croplands on land surface temperature,” draws on two decades of satellite data to analyze the biological and physical mechanisms by which croplands affect land surface temperatures.  

Chen’s findings highlight the complex relationship between land use, vegetation, and regional climate and offer valuable insights into sustainable agriculture and land-based climate change mitigation. The research found that 60 percent of global croplands exhibit annual warming effects while 40 percent have a cooling effect, and warming is strongest in temperate dry regions surrounded by trees.  

“Crops influence the absorption and redistribution of radiant energy, ultimately affecting surface temperatures,” said Chi Chen. “Our research shows that crops mainly adjust convection efficiency, a more physical rather than biological process, to regulate evapotranspiration and land surface temperature. Minimizing disturbances to this efficiency is crucial to mitigate the temperature impact of cropping activities.”