Environmental impact assessment depends on solid measurement standards and monitoring tools. Science and technology can help explain what is happening to European water, soil, air and forestry, undertake chemical and biological analyses, and inform policy makers and the public at large. European Research Commissioner Philippe Busquin and European Environment Commissioner Margot Wallström today launched a new network of scientific institutes, universities and enterprises – the METROPOLIS network – whi

New farm practices and new breeds of crops might someday add to mankind’s toolbox for controlling greenhouse gases that contribute to global climate change.

Research under way at Purdue University seeks to control the most prominent of these greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide, by corralling carbon on the farm in a process known as carbon sequestration.

The research is being supported with a grant of nearly $1 million to Purdue from the Consortium for Agricultural Soil Mitigation

Scientist continues to build case for origin of plate tectonics

A Saint Louis University geologist has unearthed further evidence in his mounting case that shifting of the continents — and perhaps life on Earth — began much earlier than many scientists believe.

Tim Kusky, a professor of Earth and atmospheric sciences, has discovered the world’s first large intact pieces of oceanic mantle from the planet’s earliest period, the Archean. The nearly mile-long section of rock,

Blinding dust storms can seriously ruin your plans for a landing on Mars. ESA is adapting the global climate models that we use to forecast our weather on Earth for the turbulent conditions that Mars offers its future visitors.

You could hardly call the weather on Mars pleasant, and presently it is far from predictable. As well as having an average surface temperature of -63°C, and a thin, inhospitable atmosphere of mainly carbon dioxide, last year, a springtime dust storm smothered the enti

Technique could dramatically diminish hunger in Africa

Corn harvests on experimental plots and in farmers’ fields in four East and Southern African countries have yielded striking results in long-term trials of an innovative witchweed-fighting technology developed by a Weizmann Institute scientist in collaboration with researchers at CIMMYT (the Spanish acronym for the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center). The new technology will be presented to seed producers, governmen

UC Berkeley scientist urges drilling into frozen lake under ice near South Pole as prelude to drilling into subglacial lakes in Antarctica and into Mars polar caps

Measurements of the ice temperature far below the South Pole suggest that a so-called “lake” discovered at the base of the ice is most likely permafrost – a frozen mixture of dirt and ice – because the temperature is too low for liquid water.
Far from being a disappointment, says a University of California, Berkeley p

Capping two years of research, a nationwide group of over 100 scientists has created a powerful new computer model of the Earth’s climate. The model surpasses previous efforts by successfully incorporating the impact of such variables as ocean currents and changes in land-surface temperatures.

Researchers will use the model, called CCSM-2 (Community Climate System Model, version 2) to probe how our climate works and to experiment with “what-if” scenarios to predict what our climate may be l

The scientific community concurs that the occurrence of harmful algal blooms (HABs) is increasing worldwide. The annual loss from HABs worldwide is probably more than $1 billion, including both mortality and unmarketable products. The annual human cost has been estimated at 2,000 cases of poisoning with 15% mortality. Because there is no international record of economic loss and human intoxication incidents by HABs, these numbers are almost certainly underestimates.

In a recent issue of Nort

A process that would be a plastics recycler’s nightmare may help farmers deal with the disposal of agricultural and domestic plastics by creating burnable, energy-efficient plastic nuggets, according to a Penn State agricultural engineer.

“In plastics recycling there are two unbreakable rules,” says James W. Garthe, instructor in agricultural engineering and cooperative extension specialist. “You cannot mix types of plastic, and the plastics must be clean. This process does both since

There is high temperature inside our planet and the reason is not known yet. A common belief that the Earth`s interior is heated by radioactive elements is now doubted of. Professor Felix Letnikov from Irkutsk Institute of the Earth`s Crust have proposed an idea that the heat is formed in the outer core because of friction between its layers.

Different geophysical data confirm that there is a heat source inside the Earth. In the mantle there are zones with low viscosity, which corre

A team of Ohio State University researchers has returned from an expedition in southeastern Alaska with the longest ice core ever drilled from a mountainous glacier.

The core measures 460 meters (1,509 feet) and is 150 meters (492 feet) longer than the previous longest core – a record of ice from the Guliya ice cap in western China that eventually relinquished a climate record stretching back 760,000 years – the oldest such record retrieved to date.

Until the new core is analyzed in

Sugar refineries and distilleries produce effluent which is harmful for the environment. The sugar industry produces two tonnes of sugar cane bagasse (a straw-like material) for every tonne of refined sugar. For Cuba this translates into 10 to 20 million tonnes of bagasse per year.

Distilleries, often associated with sugar cane production, emit copious amounts of polluting volatile components (especially volatile organic compounds, VOCs). In Cuba, an estimated annual 1 600 tonnes of ethanol

Using camera surveillance and radio tracking equipment, scientists have provided potential evidence showing how badgers could pass on bovine tuberculosis to cattle in UK farms.

In a paper published in a forthcoming Proceedings B, a Royal Society journal, researchers from the University of Sussex and the Central Science Laboratory have discovered that badgers regularly forage in farm premises such as cowsheds, feed sheds and cattle troughs, thereby making frequent contact with cattle, both di

Scientists at the Sainsbury Laboratory (SL)[1], Norwich, have today reported the discovery of a plant gene that is essential in controlling the interactions between plants and microorganisms that enable them to establish intimate associations, which are of benefit to both partners. Published in the international science journal Nature, the report’s findings suggest that it may be easier than previously imagined to design plants that are able to make their own nitrogen fertiliser.

The roots

Trees may not actually commit suicide, but certain species do produce pollutants that hamper their own growth while contributing to global climate changes and causing harm to other life forms, contend two Texas A&M University researchers.

Renyi Zhang, an atmospheric chemist, is studying one such substance, isoprene, given off by oak trees and leading to increased ozone in our atmosphere. Working under a $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, Zhang and chemistry professor Simon

Thanks to SEK 7 million in funding from the EU and other financiers, Luleå University of Technology in Sweden is now able to launch an urgent research project for the future of the Barents region. The overarching goal is to gather the knowledge and competence needed to solve and prevent looming environmental problems in the area.

The project will be carried out in cooperation between universities and companies in Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Russia and is a step in Luleå University of Techno