In the future, a newly discovered mechanism in control of plant nutrition could help to achieve higher harvests in a sustainable way. Scientists from the Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing (China) discovered this mechanism in their research on Asian rice in collaboration with Professor Dr. Stanislav Kopriva from the University of Cologne’s Botanical Institute and the Cluster of Excellence CEPLAS. The balance between nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) is decisive for crop yield. Both nutrients, which the plant absorbs from the soil through its roots, interact more strongly with each other than previously known. The study ‘Nitrate-NRT1.1B-SPX4 cascade integrates nitrogen and phosphorus signalling networks in plants’ has now appeared in the journal Nature Plants.