EurekAlert! - Earth Science

'Genetic arms race' between bacteria, viruses subject of stimulus grant

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Michigan State University) The oceans teem with microscopic bacteria that produce much of Earth's oxygen as they absorb carbon dioxide greenhouse gas. But fast-mutating viruses also populate the seas, attacking marine bacteria in an ages-old evolutionary arms race. A Michigan State University researcher will probe that ancient dynamic against the backdrop of environmental and climate change, and the pivotal role played by aquatic bacteria in maintaining the Earth's biological balance.

A question of height

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres) Intelligent countryside management could improve the survival chances of animal and plant species threatened by climate change. The creation of small heat-shielded habitats and better links between habitats would counteract a moderate temperature increase, and give threatened species more time to adapt better and/or to migrate to cooler regions. This is the conclusion drawn by scientists at the Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research from a British study on saving the Large Blue butterfly.

AGU journal highlights - July 2, 2009

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(American Geophysical Union) Featured in this release are research papers on the following topics: "Ancient supervolcano's eruption caused decade of severe winters"; "Understanding fault movement during Wenchuan earthquake"; "First direct measurement of lunar backscatter from solar wind"; "Reducing uncertainty in estimates of global sea level rise"; "Boost in freshwater content of Arctic Ocean "; "Data gaps in records hinder detection of climate trends"; "Glaciers cause seismic activity in Iceland"; and more.

LRO's first moon images

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center) NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter has transmitted its first images since reaching the moon on June 23. The spacecraft's two cameras, collectively known as the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera, or LROC, were activated June 30. The cameras are working well, and have returned images of a region in the lunar highlands south of Mare Nubium (Sea of Clouds).

Pacific Northwest forests could store more carbon, help address greenhouse issues

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Oregon State University) The forests of the Pacific Northwest hold significant potential to increase carbon storage and help mitigate greenhouse gas emissions in coming years, a recent study concludes, if they are managed primarily for that purpose through timber harvest reductions and increased rotation ages.

UT multimedia program increases middle school interest in science

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston) Middle school students who were part of a unique science learning program developed by the University of Texas School of Public Health showed significant increases in interest and achievement scores compared to other students, a recent study found.

Ferns took to the trees and thrived

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Duke University) As flowering plants like giant trees quickly rose to dominate plant communities during the Cretaceous period, the ferns that had preceded them hardly saw it as a disappointment.

All in sight

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres) A new measurement system for the detection of whales is used for the first time on board of the research vessel Polarstern. Visual sightings of whales by marine mammal observers are usually based on observations of the spout, the condensing and warm breathing cloud. It rises between one meter and ten meters over the water surface and remains visible for only a few seconds. A thermal imaging camera now uses the heat of this spout.

Evolution: Crabs go deep to avoid hot water

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(National Oceanography Centre, Southampton (UK)) Researchers from the National Oceanography Center, Southampton, have drawn together 200 years' worth of oceanographic knowledge to investigate the distribution of a notorious deep-sea giant -- the king crab. The results, published this week in the Journal of Biogeography, reveal temperature as a driving force behind the speciation and radiation of a major seafloor predator -- globally, and over tens of millions of years of Earth's history.

Scientists 'rebuild' giant moa using ancient DNA

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(University of Adelaide) Scientists have performed the first DNA-based reconstruction of the giant extinct moa bird, using prehistoric feathers recovered from caves and rock shelters in New Zealand.

Nursery programs for corals receive TLC from NOAA this Independence Day

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science) As the nation celebrates its birth on the 4th of July, University of Miami Prof. Diego Lirman and fellow coral nursery scientists will be celebrating as well. NOAA announced that The Nature Conservancy and its partners' staghorn and elkhorn coral recovery projects, including Lirman's nursery in Biscayne National Park, will receive $350K in stimulus support from the ARRA to further develop large-scale, in-water coral nurseries and restore reefs along Florida's southern coast and in the US Virgin Islands.

Climate change and the mystery of the shrinking sheep

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Imperial College London) Milder winters are causing Scotland's wild breed of Soay sheep to get smaller, despite the evolutionary benefits of possessing a large body, according to new research due to be published in this week's Science Express.

Mars data published in Science this week

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(University of Arizona) Four papers in the journal Science this week offer new details about the history of water on Mars, gleaned from the 2008 NASA Phoenix Mars Mission that was operated from the University of Arizona.

Climate change and the mystery of the shrinking sheep

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(American Association for the Advancement of Science) Changing winter conditions are causing Scotland's wild Soay sheep to get smaller despite the evolutionary benefits of having a large body, researchers report in a study that shows how climate change can trump natural selection.

Forest Service designates new experimental forest in Tongass National Forest

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station) The USDA Forest Service established a new experimental forest in Alaska on June 25. The 25,000-acre Héen Latinee Experimental Forest is located inside the Tongass National Forest, and is easily accessible by road from Juneau, Alaska. It is part of the largest temperate rain forest in the world.

Earth's most prominent rainfall feature creeping northward

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(University of Washington) The rain band near the equator that determines the supply of freshwater to nearly a billion people throughout the tropics and subtropics has been creeping north for more than 300 years. If the band continues to migrate at just less than a mile a year, which is the average for all the years it has been moving north, then some Pacific islands near the equator may be starved of freshwater by midcentury or sooner.

International team of students and scientists on month-long field course in Siberian Arctic

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Woods Hole Research Center) Scientists and undergraduate students from across the United States and Russia are departing July 2 for a month-long field course in the Russian Arctic. The program, known as the Polaris Project, is training future leaders in arctic research and education, and informing the public about the impacts of climate change.

Desert rhubarb -- a self-irrigating plant

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(University of Haifa) Researchers from the department of science education-biology at the University of Haifa-Oranim have managed to make out the "self-irrigating" mechanism of the desert rhubarb, which enables it to harvest 16 times the amount of water than otherwise expected for a plant in this region based on the quantities of rain in the desert. This is the first example of a self-irrigating plant worldwide.

The least sea ice in 800 years

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(University of Copenhagen) New research, which reconstructs the extent of ice in the sea between Greenland and Svalbard from the 13th century to the present indicates that there has never been so little sea ice as there is now. The research results from the Niels Bohr Institute, among others, are published in the scientific journal Climate Dynamics.

Plants save the earth from an icy doom

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Yale University) Fifty million years ago, the North and South poles were ice-free and crocodiles roamed the Arctic. Since then, a long-term decrease in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has cooled the Earth. Researchers at Yale University, the Carnegie Institution of Washington and the University of Sheffield now show that land plants saved the Earth from a deep frozen fate by buffering the removal of atmospheric CO2 over the past 24 million years.

Plants put limit on ice ages

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Carnegie Institution) When glaciers advanced over much of the Earth's surface during the last ice age, what kept the planet from freezing over entirely? This has been a puzzle to climate scientists because leading models have indicated that over the past 24 million years geological conditions should have caused carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere to plummet, possibly leading to runaway "icehouse" conditions. Now researchers writing in Nature report on the missing piece of the puzzle -- plants.

Mangrove-dependent animals globally threatened

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(American Institute of Biological Sciences) An assessment in the July/August issue of BioScience finds that substantial numbers of terrestrial vertebrates are restricted to mangrove forests. Many of these specialized species are listed as threatened by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. Prospects for mangrove-restricted animals are bleak, because more than two percent of mangrove forests are lost each year.

A young brain for an old bee

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Society for Experimental Biology) Scientists have found that by switching the social role of honey bees, aging honey bees can keep their learning ability intact or even improve it. The research team is hoping to use them as a model to study general aging processes in the brain and how to prevent or ameliorate cognitive impairments associated with old age. The results will be presented at the Society for Experimental Biology Meeting on Wednesday, July 1.

Key to evolutionary fitness: Cut the calories

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Society for Experimental Biology) Charles Darwin postulated that animals eat as much as possible while food is plentiful, and produce as many offspring as this would allow. However, new research shows that, even when food is abundant, intake reaches a limit. Dr. Teresa Valencak will discuss the theory that animals actively limit their energy turnover to maintain a higher level of reproductive success over their lifetime at the Society for Experimental Biology Meeting on Wednesday, July 1.

UT Austin professor honored with prestigious mathematics award

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 EDT

(Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics) Mary F. Wheeler, of the University of Texas at Austin, will be awarded the Theodore von Kármán Prize at the SIAM Annual Meeting for her seminal research in numerical methods for partial differential equations, her leadership in the field of scientific computation and service to the scientific community, and for her pioneering work in the application of computational methods to the engineering sciences, most notably in geosciences.