Scientists have found that organic nitrogen is more important for plant growth than previously thought and could contribute to maintaining diversity in grasslands.
Until recently it was generally believed that the most important source of nitrogen for plants was inorganic nitrogen. However, researchers funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) from the University of Lancaster and the Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research (IGER) have
For decades the study of fish bones was considered one of the most esoteric branches of archaeology, but now it is helping to reveal the massive significance of the fishing trade in the Middle Ages.
New research co-ordinated by archaeologists at the University of York will spotlight the earliest development of Europe’s sea fisheries and, given the continuous expansion of sea fishing since the Middle Ages, the ultimate origin of today’s fishing crisis.
The three-year p
These insects, now dominant in terrestrial ecosystems, flourished with the rise of flowering plants
Ants are considerably older than previously believed, having originated 140 to 168 million years ago, according to new Harvard University research published in the journal Science. But these resilient insects, now found in terrestrial ecosystems the world over, apparently only began to diversify about 100 million years ago in concert with the flowering plants, the Harvard scienti
Environmental arsenic pollution is a serious and growing environmental problem, especially on the Indian subcontinent. Researchers at the University of Georgia had, several years ago, used genetic techniques to create “arsenic-eating” plants that could be planted on polluted sites.
There was a problem, however. The arsenic sequestered from soil remained largely in the roots of the plant, making it difficult to harvest for safe disposal. Now, the research team, led by geneticis
New initiative is an alternative to destruction of their forests in order to develop economically
In an article this Friday (April 14) in the international magazine New Scientist, a leading rainforest biologist from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama argues that a new initiative by developing nations offers great promise to help reduce the rampant rate of tropical forest destruction.
William Laurance, a Smithsonian scientist who is also president of t
Over half of all plant species in Europe are at serious risk because of climate change. This is the finding of an international team of scientists working on the ALARM project led by the Centre for Environmental Research in Leipzig-Halle (UFZ). Preliminary findings have recently been presented in connection with the UN Conference on Biological Diversity in Curitiba, Brazil.
The situation is expected to become particularly dramatic at middle to high altitudes in mountainous area
Dauphin Island Sea Lab scientists seek to restore Robinson Island grassbeds by utilizing sea birds’ ’natural functions’
Although most people consider bird droppings a nuisance, scientists at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab see them as a rich source of phosphorus, a natural fertilizer for grassbeds which have been destroyed by boat propellers. Over the next couple of months, Sea Lab scientists Dr. Ken Heck and Dr. John Dindo will be setting out bird stakes in an effort t
Joint study largely confirms earlier dire predictions of species loss from climate change
The Earth could see massive waves of species extinctions around the world if global warming continues unabated, according to a new study published in the scientific journal Conservation Biology.
Given its potential to damage areas far away from human habitation, the study finds that global warming represents one of the most pervasive threats to our planet’s biodiversity – in
A “dead zone” that formed in 2001 in Narragansett Bay left a lethal legacy, Brown University research shows. In a study of nine mussel reefs, published in Ecology, researchers report that oxygen-depleted water killed one reef and nearly wiped out the rest. A year later, only one of the nine reefs was recovering. The result was a sharp reduction in the reefs’ ability to filter phytoplankton, a process that helps control “dead zone” formation.
Fish kills, foul odors and closed beaches
In the last decade, the new theory of metabolic ecology has derived general predictions for a wide range of ecological patterns from fundamental physical and biochemical principles.
Predictions for tree growth, mortality and size distributions are particularly significant in light of their potential to help explain globally important carbon stores and fluxes of tropical forests. In a forthcoming pair of papers in Ecology Letters, Muller-Landau and collaborators associated
A special issue containing a number of articles in aspects of amphioxus genetics research, authored by leading international scientists, has just been published in International Journal of Biological Sciences.
The discovery in the 1980’s that animals as diverse as flies and mouse shared a toolkit of basic developmental genes helped to unite biologists, leading to the creation of the new discipline of evolutionary developmental biology that tries to explain the evolutionary c
Emissions under control in coal combustion with new technology
VTT is developing technology that will allow fuels including coal to be utilised more efficiently in energy production; even without emitting any carbon dioxide.
In the new technology fossil fuels are combusted with pure oxygen separated from the air. Combustion gas consists mostly of carbon dioxide and water vapour. Carbon dioxide can be liquefied after cooling and stored in geological formations.
Polar stratospheric clouds have become the focus of many research projects in recent years due to the discovery of their role in ozone depletion, but essential aspects of these clouds remain a mystery. MIPAS, an instrument onboard ESA’s Envisat, is allowing scientists to gain information about these clouds necessary for modelling ozone loss.
“The Michelson Interferometer for Passive Atmospheric Sounding (MIPAS) is unique in its possibilities to detect polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs)
Plants apparently do much less than previously thought to counteract global warming, according to a paper to be published in next week’s online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The authors, including Bruce Hungate of Northern Arizona University and lead author Kees-Jan van Groenigen of UC Davis, discovered that plants are limited in their impact on global warming because of their dependence on nitrogen and other trace elements. These elements are e
This year, spring is so late that the global climate warming is hardly believable. Is it applicable to Russia? Probably the fact is that weather cataclysms and anomalies are now occuring more and more frequently, and warm autumn gets balanced by frosts and cold spring? Phenologists from the Institute of Global Climate and Ecology of Rosgidromet (Hydrometeorological Committee), Russian Academy of Sciences, decided to find out what was happening in reality in European part of Russia, and analyzed obs
New projections hopeful
Deforestation and habitat loss are expected to lead to an extinction crisis among tropical forest species. Humans in rural settings contribute most to deforestation of extant tropical forests. However, “Trends such as slowing population growth and intense urbanization give reason to hope that deforestation will slow, regeneration will accelerate, and mass extinction of tropical forest species will be avoided,” report S.J. Wright, Smithsonian Tropical Resea
Feedback
