BACKGROUND The ethnic population of Arunachal Pradesh uses a number of orchids as such, or in decoction for various ailments. Three untapped orchids namely, Rhynchostylis retusa, Tropidia curculioides and Satyrium nepalense, traditionally used in tuberculosis, asthma and cold stage of malaria in folk medicine, were selected for the present study. METHODS Dried material of each plant was divid...

About one third of all orchid species are deceptive, i.e., not providing any reward to their pollinator. Such species often have lower visitation rates compared to rewarding relatives. This could result in lower levels of geitonogamous selfing and thus would provide an advantage in term of progeny fitness through inbreeding avoidance. This hypothesis could be tested by comparing the level of in...

The great majority of plant species in the tropics require animals to achieve pollination, but the exact role of floral signals in attraction of animal pollinators is often debated. Many plants provide a floral reward to attract a guild of pollinators, and it has been proposed that floral signals of non-rewarding species may converge on those of rewarding species to exploit the relationship of ...

Orchids show an astonishing floral diversity yet an ability to hybridize in the hands of breeders. Nigel Williams reports on a new study that shows how neighbours appear to avoid the hybrid trap in the wild.

Indonesia is a tropical country that has natural forests and suitable for orchid species habitat, leading to more than 5,000 of orchids grow. The area the main distribution centre epiphytic orchids, one which Dendrobium, grows 1,000 throughout world. Orchid seeds are very small do not have an endosperm, making germination difficult in their habitat. Mycorrhizal association with plays role survi...

The NAD(P)H dehydrogenase complex is encoded by 11 ndh genes in plant chloroplast (cp) genomes. However, ndh genes are truncated or deleted in some autotrophic Epidendroideae orchid cp genomes. To determine the evolutionary timing of the gene deletions and the genomic locations of the various ndh genes in orchids, the cp genomes of Vanilla planifolia, Paphiopedilum armeniacum, Paphiopedilum niv...

What is your greatest research ambition? I would like to contribute to improving the integration of understanding of the functioning of organisms, and of their interactions with the environment across large ranges of time and space. This would help in making post-genomic information more relevant to investigating environmental issues, and suggesting to those working at the molecular-to-cellular...

Dust seeds that germinate by obtaining nutrients from symbiotic fungi have evolved independently in orchids and 11 other plant lineages. The fungi involved in this 'mycoheterotrophic' germination have been identified in some orchids and non-photosynthetic Ericaceae, and proved identical to mycorrhizal fungi of adult plants. We investigated a third lineage, the Pyroleae, chlorophyllous Ericaceae...