Scottish company IceRobotics will develop a new generation of dairy farm robots, working in a way that is similar to an elephant’s trunk, that can milk cows without the presence of the farmer, thanks to an Invention & Innovation award of £98,000 from NESTA (the National Endowment for Science, Technology & the Arts), the organisation that invests in UK creativity and innovation.

While studying for his PhD, Dr Bruce Davies, a senior lecturer at Heriot-Watt University, came up with the id

New findings from Queen’s researchers will help experts better predict future drought patterns and water availability in the prairies.

An international research team including biologists Kathleen Laird and Brian Cumming from the Queen’s Paleoecological Environmental Assessment and Research Laboratory (PEARL), and Peter Leavitt from the University of Regina, investigated records of drought over the past 2000 years from lake sediments in the northern Canadian prairie region (Manitoba

A robust, new geographic information systems (GIS) software tool developed by a University at Buffalo geographer is helping the U.S. Forest Service to more quickly and accurately assess and contain the devastation wrought by forest fires, such as last summer’s Hayman Fire, Colorado’s worst wildfire ever. That fire, which covered more than 137,000 acres and blazed for more than two weeks, destroyed 133 homes and caused damage of approximately $39 million.

The new tool, to be presen

Scientists from the University of Colorado at Boulder have proposed a long-sought answer to how atmospheric sulfate aerosols are formed in the stratosphere.

Conducted by researchers at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, or CIRES, the research shows how a fundamental molecular process driven by sunlight may play a significant role in determining the planet’s energy budget.

The research was a collaboration between Veronica Vaida, chair of the CU-B

Long-time farmers’ friend shows promise against parasitic worms

Roundworms, hookworms, watch out. Scientists this week announced that a soil bacterium’s crystal proteins, long an effective weapon against many insect pests, are toxic to some nematodes, too.

The crystal proteins – created by some strains of Bacillus thuringiensis, more commonly known as Bt – thwart the development of some nematodes and kill others outright. The findings raise the possibility that thes

Because of Earth’s dynamic climate, winds and atmospheric pressure systems experience constant change. These fluctuations may affect how our planet rotates on its axis, according to NASA-funded research that used wind and satellite data.

NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise (ESE) mission is to understand the Earth system and its response to natural and human-induced changes for better prediction of climate, weather and natural hazards, such as atmospheric changes or El Nino events that

Breakthrough could help resolve serious problems in oceanography and climate research

Scientists at Johns Hopkins University and the University of California-Irvine have finally been able to field-test theories about how wind transfers energy to ocean waves, a topic of debate since the 19th century that had previously proved impossible to settle experimentally.

The new results may help lead the way to the resolution of a longstanding problem in scientists’ understanding

Biologists in Manchester have helped create a breakthrough in alcohol production that could save industry millions of pounds and help clean up the environment.
Many distilleries across Europe still rely on 19th century technology pioneered by Louis Pasteur, so the invention of a vastly more efficient fermenting system offers exciting possibilities.

The technology, developed at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU), also allows continuous production of the chemical, an improvement from

Fruits and veggies grown organically show significantly higher levels of cancer-fighting antioxidants than conventionally grown foods, according to a new study of corn, strawberries and marionberries. The research suggests that pesticides and herbicides actually thwart the production of phenolics — chemicals that act as a plant’s natural defense and also happen to be good for our health. Fertilizers, however, seem to boost the levels of anti-cancer compounds.

The findings appear in the

Concern is rising among governments worldwide about electronic wastes — discarded computers, televisions, cell phones, audio equipment and batteries — leaching lead and other substances that may seep into groundwater supplies.

Just one color computer monitor or television can contain up to eight pounds of lead. Consider that amount in light of the estimated 12 million tons of “e-wastes” that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates may soon be dumped into American landfills.

Adding composted biosolids rich with iron, manganese and organic matter to a lead-contaminated home garden in Baltimore appears to have bound the lead so it is less likely to be absorbed by the bodies of children who dirty their hands playing outside or are tempted to taste those delicious mud pies they “baked” in the backyard.

The garden soil in the study is similar to potentially hundreds of thousands of yards contaminated with lead in Baltimore and other inner cities, according to Sally

Northern Australia has been invaded by one of the world’s worst species of ant, which could affect human health and damage the environment, agriculture, and the economy.

“This little Yellow Crazy ant will destroy our culture, our land, our life,” says Balupalu Yunupingu, Dhimurru senior ranger, north-east Arnhem Land.

The Yellow Crazy ant is recognised by the Global Invasive Species Programme as one of the world’s worst invaders, and represents a major environmental and ec

The method that has been used for the last twenty years to measure the production of laughing gas (nitrous oxide) from different natural sources is not working. Due to this, the size of some of the sources of this greenhouse gas has locally probably been underestimated. This conclusion is drawn by Nicole Wrage in her PhD thesis that she is going to defend at Wageningen University (Netherlands) on February 28.

The research of the PhD student at Wageningen University focussed on the productio

The relatively powerful earthquake that hit eastern France last Saturday confirms the findings of the postgraduate research currently being conducted by Gideon Lopes Cardozo at the Université Louis Pasteur in Strasbourg and the Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences at the VU Amsterdam. Lopes Cardozo is investigating the causes of earthquakes in the southern part of the Rhine Graben. His research is sponsored by the European Union and has shown that the movements in the earth’s crust in the area around t

The global decline of amphibians has received a great deal of attention because amphibians are thought to be indicator species, or ’canaries in a coal mine’ that provide an early warning of environmental degradation. The topic has drawn considerable scientific attention because there is no obvious, simple cause. Researchers are pursuing a handful of explanations for worldwide losses of amphibian populations that are likely to affect all species. Thus, understanding the complexity of the amp

Researchers from St. Petersburg have invented a way to check the viability of grains and seeds of agricultural plants without prior germination. The scientists assume that injuries of the germ and tissues of seeds can be revealed through X-ray photomicrography with the help of computer recognition system. This methodology allows determining the quality of wheat, barley, oats, rye and other crops seed grain.

The yield of agricultural cultures depends on viability and quality of seed grain. Re