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The International Committee on Phytolith Morphometry has published a new study on inter- and intra-observer variation in phytolith morphometry. Questions addressed include: how large is inter- and intra-observer variation, what are the causes, and how can such variation be overcome? Study findings are relevant for other fields of science that make use of morphometry. Following […]

Are you struggling to put open science into practice? Would you like 1 to 1 help? Following on from our successful training workshops in 2023, we are offering personalised help sessions to assist phytolith researchers, and those in related fields, implement open science practices in their research projects. We can help with lots of different […]

The scientific dissemination association Hablando de Ciencia and the Zaidín Experimental Station in Granada, Spanish National Research Council (EEZ-CSIC), in collaboration with the dissemination project Ciencia en Cómic, announce the fourth edition of the BD prize Desgranando Cómics. The objective of the prize is to stimulate the use of comics as a tool for scientific […]

The IPS is delighted to introduce IPS Envoy posts, a new feature on the website designed to increase communication among phytolith researchers. Because the phytolith research community is so large and global, it is difficult to keep up with research conducted by laboratories outside one’s own region. The Board has chosen four regional envoys who […]

For many years, the phytolith research community communicated through the listserve PHY-TALK. Unfortunately, PHY-TALK became non-operational several years ago. The IPS Board is very happy to announce that PHYTO-CHAT-L, a new listserv dedicated to discussion of anything related to phytoliths, is now operational (a big thank you to Board member Chad Yost for making this […]

We are pleased to announce the launch of a special issue of the journal Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology, which aims to bring together work on phytoliths in Asia on : reference collections, modern calibrations, and applications to palaeoenvironment. See details here! Final submission deadline: 28-Feb-2023​ Recommandations: Papers in this special issue need to comply with the […]

Francesca d’Agostini is now a PhD student at CaSEs – Culture and Socio-Ecological Dynamics, Campus de la Ciutadella, in Barcelona, Spain. At the 12th IMPR she presented her work on Understanding the relationship between the physiology of water transport and phytoliths production in selected c4 crops: an experimental approach. Abstract. Phytolith formation is related to the […]

Eduardo Trein Salgado is a PhD student at the Institute of Geosciences, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, in Porto Alegre, Brazil. At the 12th iMPR he presented a talk entitled Paleoenvironment and climate evolution reconstruction for the last 11 Ka years on the coastal plain of souther Brazil through multi-proxy analysis. Abstract. To reconstruct […]

Kristýna Hošková (Kuncová) works in the Department of Botany, Faculty of Science at Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic. At the 12th IMPR she presented her work on Geometric morphometrics as a tool for analysis of phytolith shape patterns during the evolution of grasses. Abstract. Grass silica short cell phytoliths have the great potential to track the evolutionary […]