In the latest video from Science IRL, Molly returns to NYBG’s Pfizer lab to get up close and personal with a cycad specimen. Dennis Stevenson, Ph.D., and Dario Cavaliere, MA, reveal the vasculature in a cycad’s stem with dye, and in observing the pattern can then recognize the same species in fossils. Think of this installment as a survey of the anatomical approach, versus last week’s investigation of the genetic approach, to biodiversity studies.
Watch the video below, and check out more on Science IRL’s YouTube channel!
Dario J. Cavaliere is a graduate student in the Commodore Mathew Perry Graduate Studies Program and a part-time research technician for the Cullman Program in Molecular Systematics at The New York Botanical Garden.
Meet Nitella hyalina, a freshwater alga with an especially unusual appearance. Elaborate whorls of branchlets and other three-dimensional structures make microscopic imaging of this species quite a challenge.
With advances in imaging software, N. hyalina has met its match. This software includes a stacking feature that allowed me to photograph the whole three-dimensional structure.
Check out those spiky bits! Those orange blobs are the plant’s reproductive structures, which are notoriously difficult to image. But now N. hyalina is ready for its close-up.
In the latest video from Science IRL, Molly returns to NYBG’s Pfizer lab to get up close and personal with a cycad specimen. Dennis Stevenson, Ph.D., and Dario Cavaliere, MA, reveal the vasculature in a cycad’s stem with dye, and in observing the pattern can then recognize the same species in fossils. Think of this installment as a survey of the anatomical approach, versus last week’s investigation of the genetic approach, to biodiversity studies.