Parasite eavesdrops on host to reproduce – Chemical & Engineering News

Most plants produce flowers when their leaves detect environmental cues that indicate the time is right. Parasitic dodder plants cheat. These plants dont have leaves or roots of their own. Instead, they siphon nutrients from a host plant by grafting themselves to its vasculature. A team of researchers led by Jianqiang Wu, a botanist and chemical ecologist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has now shown that a species of dodder called Cuscuta australis eavesdrops on its hosts protein messengers…

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