Friday Photo: 2/25/2022

Cade Kane, a graduate student in Botanist Scott McAdam’s lab, oversees a system of six-microscopes set up to examine water as it moves across a tree at different locations at the same time. According to McAdam, “Optical vulnerability curves are a low-cost, non-invasive means of measuring xylem embolism resistance – embolism kills a plant during drought.” A simple camera mounted on each microscope allows the lab to “phenotype six individual samples of a tree at the same time.”