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A female gray wolf and a male brown bear were spotted every day for ten consecutive days, spending time together, playing and even sharing food. “It’s very unusual to see a bear and a wolf getting on like this” says Finnish photographer Lassi Rautiainen, 56, who took these surprising photos. From what I could find, […]
Faced with the worst drought in recorded history, officials in California are turning to all sorts of creative methods to curb the rising water shortage. Most recently, 96 million black plastic balls were thrown in the LA Reservoir, which is filled with enough water to last the whole city of four million for weeks. Together, the millions of plastic balls act as a cover, shielding the water inside the reservoir from the sun's rays, especially the UV frequencies. This way, less water becomes evaporated or degraded through chemical means - about 300 million gallons of it.
A new report presented by United Nations officials at the American Statistical Association meeting in Seattle estimates that by 2100 the world's population will reach 11.2 billion people. Another less conservative scenario, however, estimates a numbers of 13 billion. Right now, there are 7.3 billion living in the world or around 80 million people more than last year.
Vidal Mendoza, a U.S. Geological Survey hydrologic technician, has been spending his past Tuesday scanning the upper Guadalupe River, looking for the right spot to measure the flow of the water. Perhaps more accurately, Mendoza has been spending his past Tuesday on a hot, mostly dry riverbed searching where the river should have been.
In the latest in a long string of lawsuits filled against fracking operations, a Texas family is claiming damages after the water well on their property exploded. The family's ranch is located just 1000 yards away from two fracking drills, which likely leaked methane to the groundwater according to the lawyer representing the family. The explosion left Cody Murray, the 38-year-old husband of the family of four, with severe burns on his arms, upper back, neck, forehead and nose along with “significant neurological damage.” He is now permanently disfigured, disabled and cannot work. He is now asking the court for retribution.
The chemical reactions used to make methanol from carbon dioxide rely on a catalyst to speed up the conversion, and scientists identified a new material that could fill this role. With its unique structure, this catalyst can capture and convert carbon dioxide in a way that ultimately saves energy.
Advances in magnet technology have allowed MIT scientists to design a cheaper, more compact, modular and highly efficient fusion reactor that is efficient enough to use commercially. The era of clean, practically inexhaustible energy may be upon us in as little as a decade, scientists report.
A new highly infectious diseases has been observed in tadpoles from three continents, threatening global populations. The disease, which was identified and described by British scientists, is a distant relative of an oyster disease. “Phylogenetic analyses revealed that this infectious agent was affiliated with the Perkinsea: a parasitic group within the alveolates exemplified by Perkinsus […]
Smoking is bad. We’re way past the point of discussing that one; it’s bad for your health, it’s bad for the ones around you, and it’s bad for the environment. Cigarette filters are made from thousands of polymer chains of cellulose acetate; once discarded into the environment, these filters create a huge waste problem. Cigarette […]
It's a tough year for salmon all around the world - now, a new health advisory issued by the U.S. Geological Survey, Bureau of Reclamation and PacifiCorp raises concerns about the future of salmon in the Klamath river in Oregon and California.
This is an article by Kristin Drexler, faculty member, Human Ecology and Forestry, School of Science, technology, Engineering, and Math at American Public University. The active participation of local communities is a critical component to the conservation of protected areas like national parks and preserves. Ironically, while these areas are most often thought of in […]
Sea animals are dying off in huge numbers off the Pacific coast from Baja, Mexico - all the way to Alaska; there's a good chance we can't really do anything about it.
Central America is home to one of the greatest biodiversity on the planet. It's here among its rainforests that you can still find large swaths of land where there aren't any humans living nearby. But being sparsely populated also makes the region an attractive route to smuggle drugs and other logistical operations. In Honduras and Guatemala, particularly, all law and order seems to cede in the face of the narco-cartels who are razing forests to build airfields, roads and even ranches right in the middle of protected national parks. It's all a nasty business, and the greatest victims are those who play the least part in it all: the wildlife.
In June, we were telling you about the Dutch city of Utrecht, which will start a new social and economic experiment: basic income: a new concept that could revolutionize society as we know it. Basic income is a type of social security in which all residents receive an unconditional sum of money, regardless of whether or not they have another source of income. Now, more Dutch cities announced their interest in participating in the initial trials.
Solar-aided power plants could mean less CO2 for a fraction of the costs of solar-only, paving the way for a full-renewable power supply.
According to a new study conducted by German researchers, even somehow magically removing massive amounts of CO2 from the atmosphere won't solve our climate problems - we need to find ways to stop emitting.
Value Farm is not necessarily a new concept, but manages to bring a stunning innovation; its scale and effectiveness and a crowded and polluted urban environment is a breath of fresh air in Shenzen, one of China’s largest cities. Value Farm is a collective effort farming effort developed by Thomas Chung, together with Tris Kee and […]
A $13.8 bn railway project funded by China linking Nairobi to Mombasa will pass right through the Nairobi National Park. Although the park hosts a huge amount of tourism and boasts a very sensitive wildlife, authorities are adamant in seeing the railway built.
Nabire was a 31-year-old Northern White Rhino from the Dvur Kralove Zoo in the Czech Republic. She suffered from uterine cysts, which made it impossible for her to breed naturally, and ultimately, one of those cysts brought her demise. She was also one of the last 5 white rhinos on the Earth.
The sea, which is actually a lake, is well known for being 10 times as salty as the ocean and for boasting the lowest exposed strip of land on Earth. The climate and unique water and swimming conditions made the Dead Sea a popular tourism spot. In the last few decades, however, it's shores have become better known for their sinkholes rather than tanning spots.
When it comes to vaccines, the young bees don't really have a choice - they're naturally immunized against specific diseases commonly found in their environment. For the first time, researchers have figured out just how they do it.
On Wednesday, the Department of Defense issued a report in which it highlights the global security implications of climate change. In the report, the authors note that climate change will exacerbate current world problems like " poverty, social tensions, environmental degradation, ineffectual leadership and weak political institutions that threaten stability in a number of countries."
Boy, was this year a scorcher! Well, what can I say, apart from get ready for more. According to an exclusive info ran by New Scientist, all but one main tracker of global surface temperature will report that this year will mark the first full degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels. I remind you that the International Panel on Climate Change warns that a two degree Celsius warming should be avoided on all costs if irreversible consequences like sea level rise, habitat loss and cataclysmic events are to be averted. This means that we're already halfway there, and the two degree mark might be reached by 2050. A four degree warming might end civilization as we know it.
A geological survey found Washington DC and the surrounding Chesapeake Bay region is gradually sinking. By the end of the century, the Chesapeake bay would be six inches lower than it is today. This is due to a natural phenomenon, not man-made global warming. But when the two add up, it could put the nation's capital a couple of feet under water, significantly affecting the lives of local residents and the city at large.
Different ant species employ various tactics to forage food and keep the colony in tip top shape. Most often scouts will scour for food, and when a source is deemed fit a trail of pheromones guide worker ants to pick up the crumbs, leftover pizza or cheerios. Ants aren't very picky, you know. What they are is very strong. It's common knowledge that ants carry loads multiple times heavier than their own weight. Some species, like longhorn crazy ants are able to carry some of the biggest loads among ants by working together, joining in a band to perform the lifting. It's a curios matter, one you might have often noticed in your very own backyard.
Chinese researchers sampled water from an underground aquifer in the Tarim Basin and found these store vast quantities of carbon dioxide as a result of human activities. If the same holds true for all the desert aquifers around the world, the trapped carbon would amount to about a quarter more than the amount stored in living plants on land. Previously, the carbon trapped in aquifers was thought to be negligible. Clearly, this isn't the case and these should not be disturbed so that the carbon doesn't wash up into the atmosphere.
A team of students from the University of Stuttgart just designed, built and raced what could be the fastest accelerating electric vehicle in the world.
If you’re thinking about the future days when robots will replace humans, well… those days are already here. The Henn-na Hotel (“Strange Hotel”) is staffed entirely by robots, including a dinosaur receptionist. They also have no room keys and a remarkable energy efficiency. ‘What we have strove to achieve with Henn-na Hotel is “The Ultimate […]
Democrat Hillary Clinton is maybe the first presidential candidate to make tackling climate change a central point. Now we actually have specifics after Clinton released on Sunday a fact sheet detailing her plan for action. Her proposals are bold, for sure. For instance, if she's elected, Hilary promises that clean renewable energy will power every home in America within a decade. To achieve this goal, she plans on bringing the total number of solar panels installed nationwide to more than half a billion before the end of her first term. Should we believe her?
New research shows that wastewater discharged from wastewater treatment plants in the Grand River watershed of southern Ontario has the potential to contaminate sources of drinking water with drugs such as cocaine, morphine and oxycodone.
After a twitter user and photographer from a city 110 km from Fukushima posted photos of mutated flowers, people started to freak out all over the internet that these plants suffered mutations due to the devastating nuclear incident from 2011 in Fukushima, Japan. According to the photographer @san_kaido, the radiation level near the daisies was measured […]
Scientists rely on a method called radiocarbon dating to determine the age of fossils or artifacts. With little or no other information available, the widely used method can accurately determine how old a sample is. This makes it one of the most powerful tools archaeologists, anthropologists and paleontologists have at their disposal. Rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere are, however, artificially aging the atmosphere and this might drastically interfere with the accuracy of radiocarbon dating. According to a new paper published by a team at the Imperial College London, "by 2050 a new T-shirt would have the same radiocarbon date as a robe worn by William the Conqueror a thousand years earlier."
Dolphins in European waters are struggling to reproduce because of the chemical pollution that lingers in their bodies for a very long time - even for their entire lifetime. Scientists were surprised to find polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in their bodies, as PCBs have been banned 30 years ago.
In a first of its kind experiment, biologists found out to everyone's surprise that boa constrictors kill prey by cutting the blood supply from the heart. It was long thought that suffocation is the snakes' modus operandi. This makes sense though, according to evolutionary biologists involved in the study. Cutting the blood supply kills prey much faster than limiting oxygen intake. This comes at an evolutionary advantage since this minimizes risks faced from predators.
Whether we’re talking about a tablet or a phone, a laptop or a music player, what matters most is the battery. And electric cars are no exception from this rule. The problem with new technologies is that there are no infrastructures to sustain them, which makes it unprofitable for the consumer, given that the lack […]
When talking about global warming, we often tend to think about droughts, water shortage and desertification. But we must not forget that 72%, almost three quarters of our planet is covered in oceans – and believe it or not, that’s where global warming will strike the hardest. A thorough study Oceanic global warming is causing […]
Japan’s Twittersphere has just rediscovered (and is loosing its collective mind over) what is probably the cutest sea slug ever – Jorunna parva, a sea slug that looks like a fluffy bunny.
The world’s next massive extinction will most likely be caused not by an asteroid impact, volcano activity or alien invasion, but by us humans. A study that looked at the past and present rates of extinction found that plants and animals are going extinct 1,000 times faster than they did before humans walked on Earth’s […]
Three startups – Carbon Engineering, Global Thermostat and Climeworks – are making machines capable of managing the buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The new devices literally suck carbon dioxide out of the air.
We’re more used to whales washing up ashore, but sharks also do it sometimes. This juvenile shark was apparently trying to hunt some seagulls and ventured out of the water too much for its own good. However, after struggles and apparent dehydration, the shark was saved by beachgoers. Initially, we see the two meter shark […]
The media is abuzz with disturbing headlines, warning us that even reduced levels of global warming will cause massive sea level rise, up to 20 feet (6 meters). Unfortunately, that’s true. But what’s almost as worrying is that everyone is treating this as news, when in fact, we’ve known for quite a while that this […]
Meet one of slickest and twisted virus nature has to offer. Called IIV-6/CrIV , researchers at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia discovered the virus effectively castrates crickets, while promoting sexual activity at the same time like an aphrodisiac so it can spread. It’s an incredibly effective strategy for the virus, but can we learn anything from it? […]
Tony Abbott, the Australian PM has been warned he is putting international investment at risk after ordering the $10 billion Clean Energy Finance Corporation not to finance new wind power. Abbott, who is a firm support of the waning coal industry has escalated his war on renewable energy, attempting to block massive investments. Wind power is […]
In the most comprehensive study ever conducted of the impacts of climate change on critical pollinators, scientists have discovered that global warming is rapidly shrinking the area where these bees are found in both North America and Europe.
Most days are windy in Denmark, but Thursday was unusually so – it was so windy that the country got its entire energy needs and more solely from wind turbines. During the afternoon it was already reported the Nordic nation’s wind turbines were producing 116 per cent of Denmark’s electricity needs, and the figure rose to […]
An email recently unearthed by one of the their own scientists casts the blame on ExxonMobil, the world's largest oil company in the world, as they had data pertaining to climate change as early as 1981 - seven years before it became public issue. They chose to fund deniers of the problem for the next 27 years.
If you’ve learned during the biology classes in school that the animals are going to adapt no matter the circumstances, your teacher did a great job. Turns out that frogs aren’t the exception to the rule, quite the contrary. New studies show that tree frogs seem to be using city drains in order to amplify the […]
Cone snails have one of the most dangerous venom in the animal kingdom. This complex venomous soup is made up of thousands of chemicals used both to hunt prey and ward off predators. The venom is enough to kill a human in a matter of minutes. Now, these lethal chemicals could be used to create a new class of painkiller for chronic pain and cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, according to University of Queensland researchers. The same team also used a genetic and proteomic to find out how the cone snails developed its venom. Apparently, the animals initially used their chemical weaponry as a defense mechanism and later on adapted it into an attack.
Coral populations are crucial to the health of oceanic environments, but corals are also extremely vulnerable to changing conditions. Researchers warn that warming waters and ocean acidification lead to coral bleaching which can cause massive damage across both the Atlantic and the Pacific.
A simple smartphone app combines the most reliable data and maps on global renewable energy potential, so you can get a better idea what's the right kind of equipment you need or if the investment is warranted in the first place. And it's all for free, too.
