Connect with us

New Hampshire

Outside/Inbox: Do trees age?

Published

on

Outside/Inbox: Do trees age?


Every other Friday, the Outside/In team here at NHPR answers listener questions about the natural world. Today’s question comes from Will Heap, calling from Coulterville, California, just outside of Yosemite National Park.”

“Driving past a beautiful forest yesterday, I had the realization that I don’t understand how trees age… So my first question is: How does aging work? Is it a breakdown of cells or in the efficacy of cells? And then my second question is: Do non-animal species such as plants, trees in particular, age the same as human cells?… What limits the age of a tree? 

Producer Justine Paradis counted tree rings to see what she could find.

Transcript

Justine Paradis: For many of us, aging is a matter of great concern. But it turns out it’s weirdly tough to define what aging actually is, even in humans.

Advertisement

Deborah Roach: Aging itself is the accumulation of damage and the decline of function with increasing age.

Justine Paradis: This is Deborah Roach, a biologist and professor emeritus at the University of Virginia. In her career, Deborah has studied the evolution of aging in plants. And it’s a topic that defies easy answers. 

Deborah Roach: Disappointingly, I think trees are a difficult species to begin to look at the questions of aging. 

Justine Paradis: Deborah studied a small leafy plant called Plantago lanceolata. She compared the performance of 1-year-old seedlings to 3-year-olds, and she found some differences based on age.

Deborah Roach: Seed size is smaller… germination is smaller. In other words, their offspring are lower quality.

Advertisement

Justine Paradis: But Plantago is a weedy, short-lived plant. It’s more challenging to study trees

Deborah Roach: You want to be able to follow individuals from the time of birth all the way through the time of death… and the trouble is that trees often live to, you know, 80 years, several hundred years, or even other species like the bristlecone pine trees, they live thousands of years. 

Justine Paradis: One measure of aging is a change in ability to reproduce. And in some tree species, scientists do observe a peak and then decline in reproduction as trees increase in size. But other tree species just keep on making babies. There’s a bristlecone pine known as Methusaleh which, at nearly 5000 years old, is the oldest known tree on earth. In the ‘70s, when a US Forest Service employee collected a pine cone from Methuselah, he found that its seeds had a 100 percent germination rate. They all grew into viable and healthy seedlings.

Deborah Roach: It’s not just that they can grow, not just that they can survive… these pine trees… can still make high quality offspring too.

Justine Paradis: Another measure of aging happens  on a cellular level. As human cells replicate, the DNA in our cells is copied, over and over. But over time, all that copying starts to degrade the DNA. When that happens in our stem cells, it’s a big deal. Stem cells are important to regenerate our tissues, blood, and neurons. And when they age, we notice. Our hair gets grey and our skin loses its elasticity. 

Advertisement

In plants, the equivalent to a stem cell is called a meristem. Meristems make new leaves and new branches. But unlike human stem cells, it looks like plant meristems may not age, in at least some species. So, “theoretically, trees can be immortal organisms.”  That’s a direct quote from a scientific review by a couple dendrologists published in 2020, titled “On tree longevity.”

The authors lay out evidence that trees don’t die because of genetically-destined cell decline. Instead, they’re killed by some external event, like a wildfire, insect attack, or the swinging of an ax. 

When it comes to super long-lived trees like Methuselah, they tend to grow very slowly in pretty harsh environments, where not much else can live.

In short, the reason that some trees can live for millennia is simple: they’re really good at surviving.  

If you’d like to submit a question to the Outside/In team, you can record it as a voice memo on your smartphone and send it to outsidein@nhpr.org. You can also leave a message on our hotline, 1-844-GO-OTTER.

Advertisement

Outside/In is a podcast! Subscribe wherever you get yours.





Source link

Continue Reading
Advertisement
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

New Hampshire

New Hampshire State Police apply to be deputized as immigration agents through ICE

Published

on

New Hampshire State Police apply to be deputized as immigration agents through ICE


Local News

New Hampshire Governor Kelly Ayotte praised the move: “Criminals who are in our country illegally and pose a danger should be apprehended and removed.”

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and other federal law enforcement agents attend a pre-enforcement meeting. Christopher Dilts/Bloomberg

The New Hampshire State Police applied to be deputized with the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, which, if approved, will allow officers to question, detain, and arrest individuals based on their immigration status.

“It is critical for state and local law enforcement to cooperate with federal authorities and protect our citizens,” New Hampshire Governor Kelly Ayotte said in a statement. “Criminals who are in our country illegally and pose a danger should be apprehended and removed.”

Advertisement

The New Hampshire State Police and Gorham Police Department are two of 32 pending program applications to work with ICE through section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act.

287(g) allows ICE “to delegate to state and local law enforcement officers the authority to perform specified immigration officer functions under the agency’s direction and oversight.” Agencies, like sheriff’s offices or department of corrections, can apply for one of three types of support, including jail enforcement model or a warrant service officer program.

New Hampshire State Police and Gorham’s department both applied for a task force model, according to a list of pending agencies released by ICE Thursday morning.

The task force model is a “force multiplier,” allowing police to enforce “limited” immigration authority, including arrests and questioning individuals about their immigration status, during routine police duties, according to ICE. The model was discontinued in 2012 during the Obama administration due to allegations of racial profiling.

“We are pleased to see that the federal government is interested in reinstating the task force model, which would grant both legal authority and protection to our State Troopers when they encounter individuals in the United States illegally,” New Hampshire Department of Safety Commissioner Robert Quinn said in a statement.

Advertisement

Previously, then-Governor Christopher Sununu petitioned the Department of Homeland Security for local officials to aid in patrolling the northern border through Section 287(g). At the time, the ACLU of New Hampshire also told DHS that, despite Sununu’s assertion, there was not a crisis at the Canadian border.

“We are particularly concerned because the State Police, the state’s largest law enforcement agency, has a history of engaging in pretextual police stops where questions of racial bias have been raised,” the ACLU wrote. “These incidents give us grave concern about how the State Police will operate if given the expanded powers it is requesting.”

While not listed in ICE’s list of pending agencies, Belknap County Sheriff Bill Wright said his office has also applied to enter a 287(g) agreement.

Profile image for Molly Farrar

Molly Farrar is a general assignment reporter for Boston.com, focusing on education, politics, crime, and more.





Source link

Continue Reading

New Hampshire

Man killed by NH police after allegedly firing gun at Planet Fitness and more top stories

Published

on

Man killed by NH police after allegedly firing gun at Planet Fitness and more top stories


Man killed by NH police after allegedly firing gun at Planet Fitness and more top stories – CBS Boston

Watch CBS News


Police shot and killed a man who was suspected of firing a gun at a Planet Fitness gym in New Hampshire.

Advertisement

Be the first to know

Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.




Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

New Hampshire

Not Quite Spring Yet: A Snow And Rain Mix Are Coming To New Hampshire

Published

on

Not Quite Spring Yet: A Snow And Rain Mix Are Coming To New Hampshire


CONCORD, NH — Forecasters at the National Weather Service issued a “hazardous weather outlook” alert on Wednesday morning, warning of light snow during the evening and Thursday morning.

Light snow will move into the southern part of the state around midnight, putting a slight pause on the pre-spring temperatures much of the state has been enjoying this week. The alert stated “an inch or so of accumulation” is expected before the Thursday morning commute. The snow will then turn to rain by late morning.

The rain will end later in the day. Highs are expected to be in the upper 30s, with lows in the upper 20s.

Advertisement

It will be mostly sunny on Friday, with highs near 40 again. Temperatures will drop into the teens as snow moves into the state between 10 p.m. Friday and 4 a.m. Saturday in Concord and the capital region. The snow is expected to start in Nashua and surrounding communities at 9 p.m. Friday and last until 1 p.m. Saturday. The Seacoast should see snow from midnight to 10 a.m. on Saturday.

The snow will dissipate as temps rise into the lower 40s on Saturday.

On Sunday, expect mostly sunny skies with highs in the mid-20s and single digits during the evening and overnight hours.

Similar weather is expected on Monday, but Tuesday should return to the 40s.

The most up-to-date weather is available on every Patch.com site in the United States. This includes 13 of the 14 New Hampshire Patch news and community websites for Amherst, Bedford, Concord, Exeter, Hampton, Londonderry, Manchester, Merrimack, Milford, Nashua, North Hampton, Portsmouth, Salem, and Windham. Patch posts local weather reports for New Hampshire every Sunday and Wednesday and publishes alerts as needed.

Advertisement



Source link

Continue Reading

Trending