Recent quotes:

Living close to urban green spaces is associated with a decreased risk of breast cancer: Residential proximity to agricultural areas is associated with an increased risk of breast cancer, study shows -- ScienceDaily

"found a linear correlation between distance from green spaces and breast cancer risk. In other words, the risk of breast cancer in the population declines, the closer their residence is to an urban green space. These findings highlight the importance of natural spaces for our health and show why green spaces are an essential component of our urban environment, not just in the form of isolated areas but as a connective network linking the whole urban area and benefitting all its inhabitants."
#paleotherapy #cancer #stress #cities #trees #green - sciencedaily.com

Pando, the Trembling Giant – Richfield, Utah - Atlas Obscura

Spanning 107 acres and weighing 6,615 tons, Pando was once thought to be the world’s largest organism (now usurped by thousand-acre fungal mats in Oregon), and is almost certainly the most massive. In terms of other superlatives, the more optimistic estimates of Pando’s age have it as over one million years old, which would easily make it one of the world’s oldest living organisms.
#synchronize #collaboration #nature #trees - atlasobscura.com

What magnets have to do with pistachios: Synchrony in ecology puts ising model to the test -- ScienceDaily

In magnetic materials, forces between neighboring atoms tend to keep electrons aligned so their magnetic forces add together. The Ising model makes quantitative predictions of how neighbor-to-neighbor interactions can create alignments over large distances. If neighboring trees are synchronized, it implies they are communicating somehow. While the authors do not identify the means of this communication, they suggest it may be a consequence of root grafting, where roots intertwine. Grafting may help one tree "tell" another that it's time to produce, which may help neighboring trees synchronize their production. The Ising model helps predict how interactions between trees next to each other spread through the whole orchard.
#synchronize #trees - sciencedaily.com

Doses of Neighborhood Nature: The Benefits for Mental Health of Living with Nature | BioScience | Oxford Academic

This growing problem has, at least in part, been attributed to the increasing disconnect between people and the natural world that is resulting from more urbanized, sedentary lifestyles (the “extinction of experience”; Miller 2005, Soga and Gaston 2015). This is supported by research that shows interactions with nature promote psychological restoration (Kaplan 1995), improved mood (Hartig et al. 2003, Barton and Pretty 2010, Roe and Aspinall 2011), improved attention (Hartig et al. 2003, Ottosson and Grahn 2005) and reduced stress and anxiety (Ulrich et al. 1991, Grahn and Stigsdotter 2003, Hartig et al. 2003, Maas et al. 2009).
#depression #paleopsychiatry #nature #trees - academic.oup.com

How Trees Calm Us Down

an additional ten trees on a given block corresponded to a one-per-cent increase in how healthy nearby residents felt. “To get an equivalent increase with money, you’d have to give each household in that neighborhood ten thousand dollars—or make people seven years younger,” Berman told me.
#meditation #nature #trees - newyorker.com