Lecture on Flora Unveiled: The Discovery and Denial of Sex in Plants

The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at UCSC will host a lecture at 11am on Sunday, March 19, at Colleges Nine and Ten Multipurpose Room, UCSC. Dr. Lincoln Taiz, Professor Emeritus of Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology, at UC Santa Cruz, and Ms. Lee Taiz, a research biologist, will talk about sex in plants, which wasn’t discovered until the late 17th century. Even after its delayed discovery, the sexual “theory” continued to be hotly debated and lampooned for another 150 years. They will discuss the existence of an ancient gender bias that plants are inherently female, and show how this bias both delayed the discovery of, and provoked opposition to, the idea that pollination is a sexual act that is required for production of the seed.