Stellenausschreibungen in Pflanzenwissenschaften und Botanik

This interview and blog post was prepared by Associate Editor Sarah Jose. Pankaj Bhardwaj is an Associate Professor of Botany at the…

This interview and blog post was prepared by Associate Editor Sarah Jose. Pankaj Bhardwaj is an Associate Professor of Botany at the…

Life on Earth evolved in environmental conditions that fluctuate with a daily cycle. Organisms from all kingdoms of life, including plants and their a…

Supplemental lighting in greenhouses has traditionally been dominated by high-pressure sodium (HPS) lights. However, a shift towards light-emitting diode (LED) technology is gaining momentum due to it...

PLOS Mental Health has been sharing a series of author tips with the aim of providing some support to those who are…

A new PNAS study uses openly available articles to map the scale of paper mill and peer review ring activity across scholarly…

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As the frequency of droughts increases, the breeding of new drought-tolerant cereal varieties may become increasingly important. However, the complex effects of drought stress on grain yield-related t...

1. Community genetics research aims to identify genetic and phenotypic mechanisms that shape communities as extended phenotypes. To date, most progress has been made identifying variation in herbivore...

Stomatal development is mediated by EPIDERMAL PATTERNING FACTORs (EPFs), a family of secreted peptides including STOMAGEN/EPFL9 in Arabidopsis. To clarify the functional role of STOMAGEN orthologues i...

Brilliantly adapted from aphorist and geneticist Dobzhansky’s phrase, “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of taxonomy” conveys the fact that various scientific fields depend on correctly identified and accurately described species. In this sense, estimating the number of extant species is one of the fundamental issues and has direct implications for biodiversity conservation. Worldwide, approximately 370,000 angiosperm species are known to science; however, studies indicate that another ~100,000 or as many as 315,000 are yet to be described for science. Brazil is recognized for its megabiodiversity and currently recognizes 32,900 native species of angiosperms. What would be the impact on conservation priorities if all undescribed species were known and the catalog was complete? To explore this, we analyzed datasets of taxonomic information available for Brazilian angiosperms published between 1753 and 2020 to understand patterns of species discovery and identify which areas in which Brazilian phytogeographic domains harbor the largest number of species unknown to science. The likely number of species remaining to be described was extrapolated using predictive models and incorporating taxonomic effort over time. We estimated that the catalog of Brazilian angiosperms is at least 19–23% incomplete, with the proportion incomplete ranging from 4% to 39% across phytogeographic domains, and 7343–9595 species still awaiting description. Despite differences between models, overall trends consistently indicate the Amazonia and Caatinga regions offer greatest potential for new species descriptions. Our analysis revealed that human population density explains more variation in rates of angiosperm description over centuries than taxonomic effort, but taxonomic effort is a better predictor of recent description rates. Worryingly, 80% of areas predicted to be richest in undescribed angiosperm species do not overlap with protected areas (PAs), but 50% are within Indigenous lands. These findings highlight the urgent need to expand collection efforts and PAs coverage, particularly in the Caatinga, which has low levels of protection, and in Amazonia, where collaboration with indigenous communities is crucial for biodiversity conservation. Without direct action, many undescribed species and their undocumented traits and potential may be lost.