Lab events

Special Invited Seminar by Dr. Justine Karst, Associate Professor, University of Alberta

Date: Tuesday, September 19, 2023

Time: 4:00-5:00 pm in Panama (EST/ GMT -5)

Title: Re-examining the ‘wood-wide web’

Abstract: Few ecological concepts have appeared in public discourse as much as the ‘wood-wide web’. This concept holds that all trees in a forest are physically connected belowground by mycorrhizal fungi, with the fungi serving as passive conduits for the flow of resources and signals among the networked trees. Through these fungal networks, ‘Mother trees’ recognize and warn their kin of danger, and, in one final act of altruism, dying trees send pulses of resources to neighbors. Though widely appealing and massively popular, is any of this true? In this seminar, I will separate fact from fiction regarding the ‘wood-wide web’ and weigh in on some causes and consequences of a narrative gone wrong.

Please join us! This seminar will be presented live from the Tupper Auditorium. For those wanting to connect virtually:
https://smithsonian.zoom.us/j/88933385051?pwd=NDJ4QlZVZUo5SUFYYS84SnRWSk…
Password: 038908