50 Years Ago

Individual plants of the amphibious buttercup species Ranunculus flabellaris Raf. are known to produce leaves of differing morphologies in response to different environments. Leaves produced in the aquatic phase are highly dissected, while terrestrially produced leaves are less dissected or simply trilobed. Bostrack and Millington have demonstrated that of the environmental variables to which the plants are normally exposed, changes in temperature produce the greatest changes in leaf morphology ... Large, readily quantifiable, differences in leaf morphology are observed with a relatively small change in an ecologically significant environmental variable ... [T]he relation between environmental change and morphological change is approximately linear over a wide range of temperatures ... These suggest a relatively simple relationship between a change in environment and morphological change.

From Nature 24 June 1967

100 Years Ago

On the afternoon of June 4 I was mowing a heavy crop of grass with the scythe when I noticed a sharp crack occurring during the cutting strokes. The noise did not occur at every stroke, but was sometimes heard three times during a stroke. The noise exactly resembled a high-tension discharge, and I can think of no explanation other than that the blade became charged, due to the friction on the very dry grass ... I may add that I am quite satisfied that the noise did not arise from the snapping of dry stems or from the scythe hitting stones, etc. I should be interested to hear if any of your readers have had a similar experience.

From Nature 21 June 1917 Footnote 1