Plant
What cannabis actually is. The botany and the long argument about sativa, indica and ruderalis; the trichomes that make the chemistry; THC and CBD and the terpenes around them; the genome, the domestication history and the landraces that regional growers shaped over centuries.
Part of Marijuana
59 moments in this segment.
- - De historia stirpium, cannabis page. Page from Fuchs's De historia stirpivm commentarii insignes showing the cannabis plant, held by the Wellcome Collection.
- - Fuchs Kräuterbuch hemp, 1543. Hand-coloured woodcut of hemp from the German edition of Leonhart Fuchs's herbal.
- - Sturm botanical plate, 1796. Copperplate engraving of Cannabis sativa from Jacob Sturm's Deutschlands Flora in Abbildungen.
- - Cannabis sativa botanical plate. Classic engraved botanical plate of Cannabis sativa showing habit, flowers and seed detail.
- - Köhler medicinal plants plate. Chromolithograph of Cannabis sativa from Köhler's Medizinal-Pflanzen, the standard 19th-century atlas of medicinal plants.
- - Chanvre cultivé, French field atlas. Plate 96 of a French pocket atlas of field and meadow plants, showing cultivated hemp beside flax.
- - Botanisches Bilderbuch plate, 1897. German botanical picture-book plate including Cannabis sativa alongside hops and other plants.
- - Die Giftpflanzen Deutschlands, 1910. Cannabis illustration from a 1910 German handbook of poisonous plants.
- - Hemp and hop family plate, 1911. Plate 28 of the Hoffmann-Dennert botanical atlas showing male and female hemp plants with hops.
- - Cannabis genotypes, phenotypes and chemotypes. University lecture on how the 0.3 percent THC hemp definition maps onto the plant's actual genetics and chemotypes.
- - George Weiblen on the biology of cannabis. American Scientist interview with the University of Minnesota plant biologist who in 2001 became the first US scientist licensed to grow cannabis for research.
- - Jonathan Page on cannabinoid biosynthesis in trichomes. Talk on using trichome-targeted genomics to work out the enzymatic pathway that builds cannabinoids in the plant's glandular hairs.
- - Larry Smart: building a long-term hemp breeding programme. Cornell plant breeding symposium talk of April 2019 on establishing a research breeding programme for a crop emerging from prohibition.
- - Structural variants in the cannabis genome. Sequencing webinar by PacBio and Medicinal Genomics scientists on structural variation across cannabis cultivars.
- - Cannabis tissue culture and germplasm storage. Mark Jordan at CannMed 2019 on preserving cannabis genetics in tissue culture banks.
- - How economics and law shaped cannabis domestication. Christopher Grassa presents genomic evidence that human markets and prohibition acted as selection forces on the domesticated plant.
- - Whole-genome sequencing of 43 cannabis and hemp varietals. Genomics seminar on markers that distinguish hemp from drug-type cannabis and the breeding implications of the THC threshold.
- - Inside the Utah State cannabis research lab. Bruce Bugbee tours the Crop Physiology Lab at Utah State University, one of the few US academic labs licensed to grow the plant.
- - Jonathan Page: secrets of the cannabis genome. Public lecture by the botanist who led the first cannabis genome assembly, on what sequencing revealed about cannabinoid genes.
- - Molecular phylotyping of cannabis strains. Ryan Lynch presents sequencing work testing whether commercial strain names correspond to genetic lineages.
- - HiFi sequencing resolves the repetitive cannabis genome. PacBio genome conference presentation on using long-read sequencing and genetic maps to resolve the plant's highly repetitive genome.
- - Cannabis classification and the Cannabaceae family. University lecture segment on the taxonomy of the genus Cannabis within the family Cannabaceae and its likely origin.
- - The cannabis naming system and its problems. Lecture on why commercial strain names fail the International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants.
- - Polyploidisation for genetic improvement of Cannabis sativa. Lecture on induced polyploidy as a breeding tool in cannabis, built on the published research literature.
- - Cannabis sativa: the forbidden flower. Natural-history short on the botany of Cannabis sativa and its relationship to humans.
- - The wonderful journey of the cannabis plant. San Diego Natural History Museum talk on ten thousand years of human cultivation of Cannabaceae for fibre, food, medicine and intoxication.
- - Hemp breeding at Cornell University. Virtual field tour with Professor Larry Smart of Cornell AgriTech through the university's hemp breeding plots.
- - Cannabis genomics and cannabinoid genes with Daniela Vergara. NOVA Education conversation with a Cornell crops specialist on the cannabis genome and how named strains actually relate to one another.
- - NOVA: where did the cannabis plant come from?. PBS segment on using the plant's genes to identify its closest living relative and reconstruct its wild origins.
- - Berkeley Cannabis Research Center: cannabis and hemp plant science. UC Berkeley research centre webinar with a panel of cannabis plant scientists and cooperative extension specialists.
- - Bruce Bugbee on indoor hemp production. Utah State crop physiologist's webinar of February 2022 on light, environment and plant physiology in controlled-environment cannabis production.
- - Daniela Vergara on hemp diversity and genetics. Cornell and USDA-ARS national hemp webinar of April 2022 on genetic diversity across the crop.
- - Genetic control of qualitative traits in hemp. Cornell plant breeding and genetics seminar by Jacob Toth on the inheritance of key hemp traits including cannabinoid type.
- - Recent advances in Cannabis sativa genomics. La Trobe University plant genomicist Bhavna Hurgobin summarises the state of cannabis genome research.
- - Zamir Punja on the development of cannabinoid-producing trichomes. Simon Fraser University plant pathologist presents microscopy and development studies of the glandular trichomes that make cannabinoids and terpenes.
- - Diploid and triploid hemp varieties. Cornell Hemp Field Day talk by George Stack on breeding triploid, seedless hemp lines.
- - Comparing sativa, indica and ruderalis morphology in the greenhouse. Side-by-side greenhouse comparison of the three named cannabis types and how their growth habits actually differ.
- - Mark Bridgen on the propagation of Cannabis sativa. Cornell horticulture professor's webinar on clonal and seed propagation methods for the crop.
- - Cannabis glandular trichomes and harvest timing. Cornell hemp webinar by graduate researcher Steven Philpott on trichome development and what it means for harvest decisions.
- - Hormonal regulation of cannabis prenyltransferase genes. Research presentation on the aromatic prenyltransferase enzymes that produce CBGA, the precursor of THC and CBD.
- - US Botanic Garden: plant science conversations on hemp. National botanic garden discussion with researchers on hemp plant science and its industrial applications.
- - Tissue culture to accelerate propagation and combat pathogens. Technical seminar on using in vitro culture to clean plant stock of viruses and pathogens.
- - Cornell Keynotes: the versatility of hemp. Cornell keynote on hemp's range of end uses from fibre and grain to construction materials.
- - Stefano Amaducci on hemp agronomy, quality and yield. Italian agronomist's 2024 Cornell hemp webinar on how field practices shape fibre and seed quality.
- - Plant tissue culture in cannabis production. Molecular biologist Shannon Smith on why tissue culture matters for clean stock and genetic preservation in cannabis.
- - Glandular trichome structure and biosynthesis. Lecture on the anatomy of cannabis glandular trichomes and the biosynthetic pathway operating inside them.
- - Inside the USDA hemp germplasm laboratory. Zach Stansell of USDA-ARS at Cornell AgriTech on the national hemp germplasm collection and what its accessions reveal about the crop's diversity.
- - Ian Graham: molecular breeding of hemp seed oil varieties. University of York researcher's 2025 Cornell hemp webinar on breeding industrial hemp for seed oil composition.
- - The cannabis pangenome: diversity, genes and evolution. Explainer walking through recent pangenome studies of Cannabis sativa and what they show about the plant's genetic diversity.
- - Todd Michael: mapping cannabis diversity with a pangenome. Salk Institute genome researcher presents a cannabis pangenome capturing variation that a single reference genome misses.
- - Are cannabis terpenes therapeutic?. Catherine Cahill of the UCLA Brain Research Institute examines whether terpenes have pharmacological effects beyond their aroma.
- - Cannabis tissue culture for advanced propagation. Carlos Ribelles on in vitro culture techniques for preserving and multiplying medicinal cannabis genetics.
- - Sexual strategies and chromosome evolution in Cannabis sativa. Daniela Vergara of the Agricultural Genomics Foundation and Cornell on sex determination and sex-chromosome evolution in the plant.
- - Genetics of powdery mildew resistance in Cannabis sativa. Cornell faculty lightning talk of May 2026 by Larry Smart on breeding disease resistance into the crop.
- - Colorado virtual hemp symposium, April 2026. State agriculture department symposium with hemp programme, federal agency and public health updates for growers.
- - Cannabis genetics panel, Berlin 2026. Panel on the state of cannabis breeding and genetics as home cultivation and legal markets expand worldwide.
- - Classifying cannabis plants by terpene profile. Agricultural engineer Iñaki García presents a chemotype classification of cannabis varieties based on terpene composition rather than strain names.
- - Crop History Consortium: cannabis and hemp. Academic webinar on the agricultural history of cannabis and hemp in the Middle East and Mediterranean.
- - Regenerative cannabis cultivation: microbiomes and living soil. CannMed 2026 panel on soil microbiology and biological resilience in cannabis cropping systems.