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Sid Meier's System for Real-Time Music Composition and Synthesis

https://patents.google.com/patent/US5496962A/en
1•GaryBluto•1m ago•1 comments

Show HN: Slop News – HN front page now, but it's all slop

https://dosaygo-studio.github.io/hn-front-page-2035/slop-news
1•keepamovin•2m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Empusa – Visual debugger to catch and resume AI agent retry loops

https://github.com/justin55afdfdsf5ds45f4ds5f45ds4/EmpusaAI
1•justinlord•4m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Bitcoin wallet on NXP SE050 secure element, Tor-only open source

https://github.com/0xdeadbeefnetwork/sigil-web
2•sickthecat•7m ago•0 comments

White House Explores Opening Antitrust Probe on Homebuilders

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-02-06/white-house-explores-opening-antitrust-probe-i...
1•petethomas•7m ago•0 comments

Show HN: MindDraft – AI task app with smart actions and auto expense tracking

https://minddraft.ai
2•imthepk•12m ago•0 comments

How do you estimate AI app development costs accurately?

1•insights123•13m ago•0 comments

Going Through Snowden Documents, Part 5

https://libroot.org/posts/going-through-snowden-documents-part-5/
1•goto1•13m ago•0 comments

Show HN: MCP Server for TradeStation

https://github.com/theelderwand/tradestation-mcp
1•theelderwand•16m ago•0 comments

Canada unveils auto industry plan in latest pivot away from US

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvgd2j80klmo
2•breve•17m ago•1 comments

The essential Reinhold Niebuhr: selected essays and addresses

https://archive.org/details/essentialreinhol0000nieb
1•baxtr•20m ago•0 comments

Rentahuman.ai Turns Humans into On-Demand Labor for AI Agents

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ronschmelzer/2026/02/05/when-ai-agents-start-hiring-humans-rentahuma...
1•tempodox•21m ago•0 comments

StovexGlobal – Compliance Gaps to Note

1•ReviewShield•25m ago•1 comments

Show HN: Afelyon – Turns Jira tickets into production-ready PRs (multi-repo)

https://afelyon.com/
1•AbduNebu•26m ago•0 comments

Trump says America should move on from Epstein – it may not be that easy

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy4gj71z0m0o
5•tempodox•26m ago•2 comments

Tiny Clippy – A native Office Assistant built in Rust and egui

https://github.com/salva-imm/tiny-clippy
1•salvadorda656•30m ago•0 comments

LegalArgumentException: From Courtrooms to Clojure – Sen [video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmMQbsOTX-o
1•adityaathalye•33m ago•0 comments

US moves to deport 5-year-old detained in Minnesota

https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-moves-deport-5-year-old-detained-minnesota-2026-02-06/
6•petethomas•36m ago•2 comments

If you lose your passport in Austria, head for McDonald's Golden Arches

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-embassy-mcdonalds-restaurants-austria-hotline-americans-consular-...
1•thunderbong•41m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Mermaid Formatter – CLI and library to auto-format Mermaid diagrams

https://github.com/chenyanchen/mermaid-formatter
1•astm•57m ago•0 comments

RFCs vs. READMEs: The Evolution of Protocols

https://h3manth.com/scribe/rfcs-vs-readmes/
3•init0•1h ago•1 comments

Kanchipuram Saris and Thinking Machines

https://altermag.com/articles/kanchipuram-saris-and-thinking-machines
1•trojanalert•1h ago•0 comments

Chinese chemical supplier causes global baby formula recall

https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/nestle-widens-french-infant-formula-r...
2•fkdk•1h ago•0 comments

I've used AI to write 100% of my code for a year as an engineer

https://old.reddit.com/r/ClaudeCode/comments/1qxvobt/ive_used_ai_to_write_100_of_my_code_for_1_ye...
2•ukuina•1h ago•1 comments

Looking for 4 Autistic Co-Founders for AI Startup (Equity-Based)

1•au-ai-aisl•1h ago•1 comments

AI-native capabilities, a new API Catalog, and updated plans and pricing

https://blog.postman.com/new-capabilities-march-2026/
1•thunderbong•1h ago•0 comments

What changed in tech from 2010 to 2020?

https://www.tedsanders.com/what-changed-in-tech-from-2010-to-2020/
3•endorphine•1h ago•0 comments

From Human Ergonomics to Agent Ergonomics

https://wesmckinney.com/blog/agent-ergonomics/
1•Anon84•1h ago•0 comments

Advanced Inertial Reference Sphere

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Inertial_Reference_Sphere
1•cyanf•1h ago•0 comments

Toyota Developing a Console-Grade, Open-Source Game Engine with Flutter and Dart

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Fluorite-Toyota-Game-Engine
2•computer23•1h ago•0 comments
Open in hackernews

Root System Drawings

https://images.wur.nl/digital/collection/coll13/search
401•bookofjoe•3mo ago

Comments

mellosouls•3mo ago
Nice link, for anybody coming to the comments first, it isn't a sample of linux system layouts as I thought.
perihelions•3mo ago
I thought it'd be about Lie groups!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root_system

joshdavham•3mo ago
The context of HN is interesting. We see the word “root” and immediately assume it has to do with a filesystem or math… but not actual, physical roots haha
fragmede•3mo ago
Or other math! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root_of_unity
kqr•3mo ago
I was convinced it was about trees, just not ... that kind of tree!
userbinator•3mo ago
I thought it'd be about the superuser account.
cynicalsecurity•3mo ago
Not what I expected, but this is really cool.
hagbard_c•3mo ago
Who'd'a'thought I'd come across root drawings from my old university where I studied at the Forestry faculty which produced these.
bookofjoe•3mo ago
HN is like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates: you never know what you might get!
daemonologist•3mo ago
How are these produced? I assume they're not actually digging a giant trench and taking a section, but are the drawings based on measurements of a specific individual in some way?

In any case, very cool to have such a collection.

throwup238•3mo ago
They usually are. It’s a process akin to archaeology where they have to carefully wash away the dirt from the root system, measuring as they go. The problem with this method is that it's hard to reconstruct the entire 3d structure of bigger plants like trees so a lot of the root drawings on the site don’t accurately show how deep they go. It’s much easier with small plants where the researcher can control the soil used.

Modern methods like xray CT or ground penetrating radar can do it nondestructively in the field but they’re usually expensive to set up compared to just sending some grad students to dig.

JKCalhoun•3mo ago
I had assumed they had grown the plant between two vertical, parallel panes of glass.
imp0cat•3mo ago
That would probably produce a distorted image of the root system.
immibis•3mo ago
On the contrary - I think you'd get an accurate image of a very distorted root system!
JumpCrisscross•3mo ago
> you'd get an accurate image of a very distorted root system

At the very least, you've taken a 3D system and reduced it to 2D. Additionally, you're exposing not only the root system but the entire microbiome around them to light and, almost certainly, unless you were incredibly meticulous about sealing, oxygen.

imp0cat•3mo ago
Me fail English? That's unpossible! :)

But yeah, that's what I mean.

kqr•3mo ago
Some of the images (at least one I saw of a tree) had section drawings both from the side and the top, so no!
garbagewoman•3mo ago
By “usually”, have you any examples of what led to that conclusion?
morsch•3mo ago
https://images.wur.nl/digital/collection/coll13/

https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1...

Karliss•3mo ago
Collection history page has a photo for part of the process https://images.wur.nl/digital/collection/coll13
lelandfe•3mo ago
Bit higher quality: https://imgur.com/a/MPpogJv
brettermeier•3mo ago
The image says it took 6 persons 5 days to expose the roots of "Pinus cembra".
paulgerhardt•3mo ago
A few ways. This particular project is doing it by hand and very tedious.

The traditional way of transplanting large trees while keeping the root system intact is with a hydrovac. A machine the size of a jet engine that liquifies the soil with water and then vacuums it up. [1]

More recent developments have tried using an AirSpade which doesn’t use water but compressed air to blow apart and then suck the soil without making a slurry which is better as the soil can be redeposited in the same hole rather than discarded[2]

[1] https://youtube.com/shorts/HinwD5-Q2xA

[2] https://youtu.be/B3XomJ6Z1I4

oasisbob•3mo ago
I'm not sure that either of these methods count as traditional.

Air spades in particular are primarily used for rootwork, not transplanting. Bareroot methods are used for smaller trees. Bare rooting leaves roots in a very vulnerable state, so doing it on larger trees you intend to move and keep alive is a serious logistical challenge.

The most traditional method I can think of is "ball and burlap" where root balls are cut free in the field, and retrieved later in the season for final packaging.

alienbaby•3mo ago
reminds me alot of patterns from diffusion limited aggregation.
thirtygeo•3mo ago
Really neat. I've often wondered about what the unexposed part of trees and plants are.

Like: am I walking on them? Are they tapping down somewhere deep or are they shallow.

The examples on a hill were interesting; I would have thought the extent would be skewed but it was fairly even

Arch-TK•3mo ago
For plants, and trees too I guess, you can just grow your own, dig it up after a while, and inspect for yourself.

Today I finished picking tomatoes from my tomato plants and pulled them up to avoid them rotting in the field as the temperature goes down. It was curious to see how the root systems varied both between the two tomato varieties I had planted, the location of the plant in relation to surrounding grass, and the type of soil they ended up in.

Sponge5•3mo ago
Recently there was an exhibition of tree root illustrations by Jitka Klimesova in Prague. I think there's potential for more art emerging from science.
29athrowaway•3mo ago
From the perspective of a plant... In soil, you have: silt, clay and sand. Plus other plants, fungi, worms, microorganisms, rocks, insects, animals, etc. Each plant needs different nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and others), need different pH levels, can tolerate different salinity, etc. There might be different humidity, precipitation, wind speed, the water tables are different...

I guess all these differences translate into how the root must structurally develop to satisfy all those requirements and constraints.

joshdavham•3mo ago
I like to think of a plant’s roots as an analogy for the knowledge required to create something.

As a weird example, a web app may be like the exposed plant above ground while the roots are that developer’s knowledge. The plant is what others see, but the roots are the intricate system that was required to create the plant.

emil-lp•3mo ago
Previously

71 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39974646

16 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29672733

18 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29672733

JohnHaugeland•3mo ago
i thought these were nervous systems until i started reading comments
zkmon•3mo ago
Wow. What did I just see? Wonderful and so satisfying. Interesting to see that some plants are tiny above ground compared to their existence below ground - plant-cartels :)

I always suspected that rivers are like trees - they also might have a hierarchy of streams (root system) inside the sea. Sometimes this root system is exposed to above "ground" in the form of deltas and streams around them.

vool•3mo ago
There's a Mastodon bot for that...

https://stefanbohacek.online/@roots

skrebbel•3mo ago
Ever thought you yanked a dandelion out by the entire root? Think again: https://images.wur.nl/digital/collection/coll13/id/676/rec/3
fragmede•3mo ago
no wonder the damned things keep coming back!
loandbehold•3mo ago
That's where glyphosate comes in handy.
alphan0n•3mo ago
The cancer was worth it to rid ourselves of a mildly offensive flower.
0_____0•3mo ago
I reckon you could skip spraying it if you were going to eat it anyway.

Did you know that wheat in the US is sprayed with glyphosate right before harvest? It causes all the wheat to dry evenly, avoiding the need to cut down the wheat and windrow it for drying. This means extra weeks in the growing season to squeeze another crop in.

garbagewoman•3mo ago
How would you squeeze another crop in?
tracker1•3mo ago
By planting one after harvesting the wheat...
jacobolus•3mo ago
Why do you need to get rid of dandelions?
NoMoreNicksLeft•3mo ago
Instead of getting rid of them, I was hoping to find seeds for Russian dandelions. I'd like to grow some. Haven't been able to find any for sale though...
sva_•3mo ago
How much of the root needs to still be in the ground for it to be able to grow back?
throwup238•3mo ago
New rosettes arise from buds at the crown and upper taproot so anything deeper than about 10cm is very unlikely to come back.

That drawing is from a very rare specimens too. Most dandelions do not grow that deep.

dsalzman•3mo ago
Whats the units?
zyberzero•3mo ago
It says cm, so centimeters (1/100 meter) - slightly less than 0.4 inches
tejtm•3mo ago
decimal place issues... I hope.

there are ten mm in a cm

456cm == 4560mm

there are 24.5 mm per inch (it is the law).

4550mm / 25.4 = 179.527 inches

or about 14.9 feet

which is about 5 yards

which is 20% of a 'murican football field if that helps

jacobolus•3mo ago
The above comment was pointing out that each 1 centimeter is slightly less than 0.4 inches. If you want to be more precise, each centimeter is about 0.3937 inches.
tejtm•3mo ago
Your correction to my perception of what you intended 0.4 inches to represent is accepted.
MikeCoats•3mo ago
Centimetres.

Their 13 cm high plant specimen had a 456 cm deep root.

mock-possum•3mo ago
So like 15 feet
garbagewoman•3mo ago
Probably, since cm are almost as useless as the grand old imperial system
oytis•3mo ago
Or 4 Emperor penguins
skrebbel•3mo ago
Depends if they're imperial Emperor penguins
SpaceNoodled•3mo ago
US customary
sva_•3mo ago
That's about four and a half AR-15 assault rilfes
nfriedly•3mo ago
My dad told me that one year his school held a contest over the summer to see who could get the longest dandelion root.
collinvandyck76•3mo ago
Always good to have a weed puller in your toolshed. A stand-up puller, specifically, that operates as a lever, allowing it to first grab deeply and then through a rotation of the handle it pulls out quite a bit of the root system. A lifesaver if you have a rain garden which is really just a synonym for weed garden.
colordrops•3mo ago
Any recommendations for a particular weed puller?
foofoo12•3mo ago
I've never used a bad one, although I wouldn't class any of them as anything stellar. All of them have looked like a snake's twisted tongue.

Using them depends on the delicate combination and application of brute force and technique. If your technique and brute force is up to spec, a crowbar works as a makeshift weed puller.

jonah-archive•3mo ago
It's kinda gimmicky but I found this thing on clearance at a local hardware store and it works fairly well (gets most weeds out without me having to bend over, which is nice): https://grampasweeder.com/collections/grampas-gardenware/pro...

It doesn't get everything but I can do more work on the tough ones when so many come right out.

jacksavage•3mo ago
This CobraHead weeder has worked well for me

https://www.amazon.com/CobraHead-Original-Weeder-Cultivator-...

downboots•3mo ago
https://tinyurl.com/467m3frp
skrebbel•3mo ago
My Fiskars Xact makes me look like a pensioner but it works really well: https://www.fiskars.com/en-gb/gardening/products/weeding-too...

Not that it gets to the bottom of my dandelions ofc, but it sure feels like it does!!

fsckboy•3mo ago
the link is to a dandelion root system that goes 450 centimeters into the ground, or 4.5 meters / 5 yards.

we'd like to know how much of that weed would your weed puller pull if your weed puller pulled a full pull?

garbagewoman•3mo ago
I would not actually like to know that, since such a device seems impossible
unit149•3mo ago
Bonatical plant systems that are lateral or burrow as this vertical way, which as the cross section for water collection is organic rorschach print.
octol•3mo ago
Imagine if there were a consciousness in each of those complex systems.
Evidlo•3mo ago
Was thinking about vectorizing these and using a pen plotter to make some cool art for my wall, but the images are not very high resolution, unfortunately :(
veeti•3mo ago
I've been doing some small scale basil growing at home using kratky hydroponics in glass jars. It's always interesting to check how the roots have grown and expanded overnight.
kjellsbells•3mo ago
Naive question, possibly poorly formed: what is the purpose of the parts of the plant? Eg the leaves are for collecting energy and the flower for reproduction...so is the "thing" that all that work is going to benefit really just the root stem?
Woberto•3mo ago
Isn't reproduction the point? The roots exist to obtain water, nutrients, minerals; leaves gather energy from the sun; this is used to grow fruit, or whatever is used for reproduction
brianpan•3mo ago
The answer to pretty much every biological "why" question is: because it reproduced. It seems simplistic, but really, a thing is here and alive because its ancestors reproduced.

Your version of the question has surprising perspective- I think you are asking what the "it" of the plant is. That's an interesting personification of a plant. I think it points to the fact that plants may be safer underground- for anchoring, for not being eaten, for getting shielded from harsh elements.

ofalkaed•3mo ago
Digging up and drawing the root systems of plants might be my dream job, I love digging, plants, and slow methodical tedious work. Anyone hiring? Pinus sylvestris[0] and Quercus robur[1] are good entries with numerous examples to compare. I would love to see a photograph of the exposed roots of their Sequoiadendron giganteum.

[0] https://images.wur.nl/digital/collection/coll13/search/searc...

[1] https://images.wur.nl/digital/collection/coll13/search/searc...

nelliottca•3mo ago
just start
kisonecat•3mo ago
I was expecting diagrams of a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root_system

(There are so many plant metaphors in mathematics!)

boguscoder•3mo ago
I expected *nix file system diagrams of some sort :) but this might be even better
gsf_emergency_4•3mo ago
Another try at seeing root systems:

https://doc.sagemath.org/html/en/reference/combinat/sage/com...

macrolocal•3mo ago
Nb. This isn't about Lie theory.
yrro•3mo ago
The accursed bindweed: https://images.wur.nl/digital/collection/coll13/id/193/rec/1
sfpotter•3mo ago
Came here expecting Dynkin diagrams, got dandelions instead.
marking-time•3mo ago
Love this