Biology Stack Exchange
Biology Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [agriculture]

53 questions
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Does cell culturing contribute to dangerous antibiotic resistance to the same degree as livestock?

According to the CDC, antibiotic resistance is one of the biggest public health challenges of our time. The largest incubator for antibiotic resistance is the factory farming of animals where livestock are administered large antibiotic doses often…
Abraham Miller
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Why are fruits so large compared to their seeds?

Why do many plants produce such large fruits(apples and strawberries,for example) if those contain only relatively small seeds?
matt
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7
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Did the old world have relatives of plants which were brought after the discovery of Americas?

When the Americas were discovered many plants were brought back to Europe. For example: potato, tomato, strawberries, chilies etc. At the same time many animals were brought to the Americas including: horses, cattle, sheep, and camels. It seems from…
log101
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Experimental Analysis: What are possible reasons for this increase in N₂O production?

My professor wanted us to each conduct an experiment for class on something we thought would interesting. My experiment was very simple, but I'm not sure how to interpret my results. (Please note that this is not for homework – I'm just genuinely…
Friendly King
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Would this mushroom make the basil dangerous to eat?

My sister is growing basil in a planter on her balcony. Recently this big mushroom started growing there. Obviously we're not going to take a bite of the mushroom, but would its existence make the basil dangerous to eat?
Ram Rachum
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Is there a practical upper limit to ploidy?

In my AP Biology class, we were discussing polyploidy, specifically, its deleterious nature in mammals and its prevalence in plants. We also learned that commercial crops, especially fruit, are often selectively bred for high magnitudes of ploidy.…
Gnumbertester
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Saving a Maize Landrace from Inbreeding Depression

I have 10 seeds of a rare corn landrace. I probably won't be able to acquire more and the cultigen's long term fate is unknown. So, I want to do my best to preserve it for future generations. Corn is largely out-breeding and used to growing in very…
JOhnny
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Are sizes of potatoes normally distributed?

I'm currently researching the variability of sizes of potatoes when all of the potatoes in question have been harvested from a single field. One question keeps coming up in my statistical analyses: Under normal circumstances, are the sizes of…
Tom Hosker
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What is a good approximate functional form for an equation relating plant growth to sunlight?

Question is in the title. I've got daily measurements of daily mean shortwave radiation at the surface, and annual measurements of plant growth (some measure, be it height or biomass or something). I want to fit a statistical model $$ growth =…
generic_user
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Optimal agriculture: maximum yield with minimum environmental impact

I read more and more stuff about alternative method of agriculture such as permaculture. Howerver, I'm not an ecologist or biologist so I don't know where to look for really good and serious articles / paper on the subject. I am really interested in…
MiKiDe
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recolonize earth desert with plants : which plants first?

if willing to recolonize earth desert , let's say sahara or any dehydrated and sterile land, without intensive human intervention, what would be the first plants / algae / fungi /bacteria to grow ? what could be the strategy to slowly bring back…
Matoeil
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Why does Porous-tube Nutrient Delivery System cultivation improve nutritional quality of Okinawa spinach (Gyruna bicolor)?

I wrote a review paper and it involves in growth system of a plant “Okinawa Spinach (Gynura bicolor)”. A research of (Wang, Fu, & Liu, 2015) reported that Porous-tube Nutrient Delivery System (PTNDS) cultivation enhanced calories from 139.5 to 182.3…
VanThanh Do
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Is it possible to extract tissue-culture material from a seed?

Here is the problem: Tissue culture is cloning, and all plants from the same mother plant are identical. On the other hand, plants grown from seed are all different. If parent plants are genetically diverse (not inbred), growing from seed is the…
Christmas Snow
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Are agave plants perennial?

If I were to harvest an agave plant for its nectar, would it kill the plant? I have watched videos of the process and it seems quite invasive.
Nomita Lama
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Impact of latitude on agriculture?

I live in southern California, where the difference between seasons is mild, and the dominant limitation on agriculture is the lack of water. (Spring is whenever it rains, not a place on the calendar.) In my early education, as is usual, I learned…
Preston L. Bannister
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