Let's connect nature with hypothesis-based experimentation and explore life in context

In a recent paper in Nature, Edith Heard from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) suggested that molecular biologists should ‘reconnect with nature’ by diversifying sampling locations. Although this approach has its own benefits, we suggest that advanced methods should rather be used to take hypothesis-based experiments to nature, thereby supplying a much-needed context for experimentation under controlled conditions. Following the CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) revolution, this approach has become accessible to many research groups. For the past several years we have developed the groundwork and initiated such experimentation. This included the assembly of a mobile laboratory on a four-wheel drive truck and examining genome-edited metabolic mutants in wild tree tobacco (Nicotiana glauca), grown in nature. Our findings included both targeted answers to focused questions, but also surprising results that could only be reached while working in natural settings.