Mark Hebblewhite can look at specific climate statistics from the north Pacific Ocean and tell you how the elk are doing in Banff National Park. The University of Alberta doctoral student is the first researcher to show a correlation between the North Pacific Oscillation (NPO) and a mammal population.
Based on many climate-related ocean measurements, researchers are able to determine positive, average and negative NPO values. A positive NPO translates into a milder climate in mo
Cadmium, commonly considered a toxic metal and often used in combination with nickel in batteries, has been found to have a biological use as a nutrient in the ocean, the first known biological use of cadmium in any life form.
Scientists have discovered cadmium within an enzyme from a marine diatom, an algae or plankton common in the ocean and a major source of food for many organisms. The finding, reported in the May 5 issue of Nature, suggests that certain trace metals, found
A University of Illinois agricultural economist who played a role in shaping a recent assessment of the world’s ecosystem and its future believes the study indicates “our children are at risk.”
“Those of us who are adults will see some of the effects of current stresses on our ecosystems but it is our children who will pay the price of our drawing down of our natural capital, unless we can find ways to make it sustainable,” said Gerald Nelson, a professor in the department of a
An international team of scientists from Israel, the United States and Germany, led by Prof. Amatzia Genin of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat, has provided, for the first time, evidence of the remarkable dynamics responsible for the formation of large aggregations of microscopic animals in the ocean.
From the surface, the ocean appears to be vast and uniform. But beneath the surface, countless number of tiny, nearly
Increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will make global temperatures rise. By studying soil cores from the Arctic, scientists have discovered that this rise in temperature stimulates the growth of microorganisms that can break down long-term stores of carbon, releasing them into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. This will lead to further increases in global temperatures.
Carbon is held in soil either in material that is easily degraded by chemical and bact
The most detailed portrait ever of the Earth’s land surface is being created with ESA’s Envisat environmental satellite. The GLOBCOVER project aims at producing a global land cover map to a resolution three times sharper than any previous satellite map.
It will be a unique depiction of the face of our planet in 2005, broken down into more than 20 separate land cover classes. The completed GLOBCOVER map will have numerous uses, including plotting worldwide land use tren
NASA is set to launch the new National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite (POES), another critical link in the development of a global Earth-observation program.
The spacecraft, NOAA-N, will lift off at 6:22 a.m. EDT, May 11, 2005, from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. “The NOAA-N satellite is key to establishing a strong Global Earth Observation System of Systems, because it will strengthen our understanding about
Coyotes tend to avoid human contact. But recently, coyotes have been getting increasingly aggressive in the eastern United States, including southeastern New York state, attacking neighborhood pets on the fringe of urban and suburban areas.
“This kind of aggressive behavior is usually the last stage before coyotes actually start attacking humans — such as small children that are perceived by the coyotes as a potential food source,” says Paul Curtis, associate professor of natura
Science article details trends in river restoration
A group of leading river scientists published a paper in the journal Science today, presenting first-of-its-kind research on the state of river restoration in the United States. Following on the heels of a related article published in the Journal of Applied Ecology that describes the five fundamental standards for ecologically sustainable river restoration, the papers document the maturing effort to reverse rising pollution level
Ecological engineering professor Marty Matlock has given his students an unusual assignment: He wants them to re-design a river.
This project requires research that co-leaders Matlock and Mike Hanley of the Nature Conservancy believe can be applied to other stream ecosystems nationwide.
“It’s about taking these ecosystems and trying to restore them to meet human needs and desires,” Matlock said. These desires include having clean water, preserving animal habitat, restori
The production of more advanced sensors to improve the detection of pesticides in water and other environmental samples has been helped by a grant of almost 1.23 million euro from the EU’s Framework Programme.
With seven partners from four EU member states, the SAFEGUARD project was designed to systematically evaluate specifically tailored enzymes as the basis for the production of sensors that are able to detect significantly lower levels of pesticides than has previously be
Emissions from cars have to be reduced further in order to meet today’s environmental demands. A new and robust exhaust sensor developed by researchers at Linköping University in Sweden has proven to meter the consistency of exhaust gases extremely well and is now on its way to the market.
It’s a tiny electronic component, no larger than the head of a pin. It has been tested both at LiU and in cars at its collaborating auto-makers, Volvo Cars in Gothenburg, Sweden, and Ford Motor
A team of marine scientists has mapped the undersea journeys of Atlantic bluefin tuna and concluded that tighter restrictions should be placed on commercial fishing to protect the feeding and breeding grounds of this top migratory predator–one of the most commercially valuable fish in the sea.
Researchers from Stanford University and the Monterey Bay Aquarium say that their new study, published in the April 28 edition of the journal Nature, offers substantial evidence that signi
The University of Washington Alaska Salmon Program, the world’s longest-running effort to monitor salmon and their ecosystems, has received nearly $2.4 million from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to expand its sampling scope and sophistication.
The Alaska-based program has applications for Pacific salmon all along the West Coast, providing insights into the fluctuating fortunes of salmon runs and their management.
The grant boosts research into climate and other
The Prince of Wales and record-breaking sailor, Ellen MacArthur, are together to trumpet global efforts to save one of the world’s most endangered yet iconic birds.
Nineteen of the 21 species of albatross are facing extinction because of a fishing method that kills 300,000 seabirds and hundreds of thousands of sharks and turtles each year.
Longline fishing, much of it by illegal pirates, has also caused massive declines in the much-prized Patagonian toothfish and several
The “dead zone” area of the Gulf of Mexico – a region that annually suffers from low oxygen which can result in huge marine life losses – has appeared much earlier this year, meaning it could be potentially larger in 2005 and affect marine life more adversely than normal, researchers are reporting.
A team of scientists from Texas A&M University, Texas A&M at Galveston, Louisiana State University and NASA recently surveyed the dead zone in the northern Gulf of Mexico and their fi
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