In close co-operation with the Directorates General for External Relations, Development and the EuropAid and Co-operation Office, the European Commission’s Directorate General, Joint Research Centre (DG JRC) is contributing to European Union initiatives in Africa by developing a dedicated Environmental Information System based on satellite and computermapping technologies.

This provides information on food needs, helps the European Commission Humanitarian Office provide aid in the

Keeping watch on the world from orbit is helping to make it a safer place to live, heard European journalists visiting the Earth and Space Week in Brussels. Experts recounted how Europe’s Global Monitoring for Environment and Security initiative is already delivering operational information services and it is set for further expansion.

A day-long series of press briefings at the Earth and Space Expo focused on the joint initiative of the European Commission (EC) and ESA known as G

Farmers, hydroelectric power producers, shippers and wildlife managers remember the Columbia River Basin drought of 1992-1993 as a year of misery.

Now researchers using tree-ring data have determined six multiyear droughts between 1750 and 1950 that were much more severe than anything in recent memory because they persisted for years, including one that stretched for 12 years. “Imagine what a drought lasting that long would do to the resources and economy of the region today,” says D

Awareness and wildlife health monitoring is key to preventing future fatalities

All recent Ebola virus outbreaks in humans in forests between Gabon and the Republic of Congo were the result of handling infected wild animal carcasses, according to a study by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and its regional partners. Appearing in the February edition of the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, the study found that many animal carcasses tested for Ebola between 2001 and 2003

How will rising levels of carbon dioxide influence ecosystems? Scientists have tackled this question numerous times, but none have tested the assumption that a single-abrupt increase in CO2 concentrations will produce changes similar to gradual increases over several decades. UCR scientist part of research team published in the journal Nature.

A paper in the Feb. 10 issue of the journal Nature titled Abrupt Rise in Atmospheric CO2 Overestimates Community Response in a Model Pla

People and farm animals are helping an invisible pollutant to change the types of plants that grow in Britain, particularly in remote and rural regions such as the Lake District.

Nitrogen deposits are the cause of the problem. The dung from farm animals produces vast quantities of ammonia. Since the industrial revolution, burning fuels (coal, gas, petrol) has lead to massive emissions of nitrogen oxides into the atmosphere. These practices lead to ammonia and nitrates being depo

A surprising link may exist between ocean fertility and air pollution over land, according to Georgia Institute of Technology research reported in the Feb. 16 issue of the Journal of Geophysical Research — Atmospheres. The work provides new insight into the role that ocean fertility plays in the complex cycle involving carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in global warming.

When dust storms pass over industrialized areas, they can pick up sulfur dioxide, an acidic trace gas e

Researchers at Oregon State University, NASA and other institutions announced today the discovery of a method to determine from outer space the productivity of marine phytoplankton – a breakthrough that may provide a new understanding of life in the world’s oceans.

Phytoplankton are the incredibly abundant microscopic plant forms that provide the basis for most of the marine food chain, half the oxygen in our atmosphere and ultimately much of the life on Earth. They have

Study in Science may help change the broad understanding of how they are formed

Researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, have produced new findings that may help alter commonly held beliefs about how chains of undersea mountains formed by volcanoes, or “seamounts,” are created. Such mountains can rise thousands of feet off the ocean floor in chains that span thousands of miles across the ocean.

Since the mid-20th centu

In January 2005, FOI (Swedish Defense Research Agency) and Ericsson Microwave Systems mapped storm-damaged areas in southern Sweden using military airborne radar technology mounted in a test aircraft operated by FMV (Swedish Defense Materiel Agency). The trial shows that the technology can cover large land areas as well as identify individual trees including those damaged by winds.

“The results are very promising,” says Lars Ulander at FOI. “This technology enables us to get an o

An experiment at the Institut Laue-Langevin raises great hopes.

The health of millions of people is threatened by the presence of arsenic in their drinking water. In countries such as India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Taiwan and Argentina, tens of millions of people drink untreated water containing levels of arsenic between ten and one hundred times higher than that recommended by the World Health Organisation ! Even in France, many sources of water, including mineral waters, will

Chemicals found in whale blubber, and initially suspected of being from industrial sources, have turned out to be naturally occurring, raising questions about the accumulation of both natural and industrial compounds in marine life.
A new study in the journal Science by researchers Emma Teuten, Li Xu, and Christopher Reddy at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) is causing researchers to rethink the sources and fates of many chemical compounds in the environment.

In order to understand the dynamics of glaciers and ice sheets as well as their interactions with climate, we need fundamental detailed knowledge about the way in which glaciers and ice sheets move. The way water is routed through glaciers is highly significant for their movement since the water pressure at the base of the glacier directly influences its speed. The water pressure acts as a hydraulic jack and pushes that glacier forwards during high water pressure events. This may increase the

A new study of climate in the Northern Hemisphere for the past 2000 years shows that natural climate change may be larger than generally thought. This is displayed in results from scientists at the Stockholm University, made in cooperation with Russian scientists, which are published in Nature on 10 Feb 2005.

The most widespread picture of climate variability in the last millennium suggests that only small changes occurred before the year 1900, and then a pronounced warming set in

Evolution as driving force in Earth’s development

A geomicrobiologist at Washington University in St. Louis has proposed that evolution is the primary driving force in the early Earth’s development rather than physical processes, such as plate tectonics.

Carrine Blank, Ph.D., Washington University assistant professor of geomicrobiology in the Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences, studying Cyanobacteria – bacteria that use light, water,

’At a snail’s pace’

Earth and planetary scientists at Washington University in St. Louis are studying snail fossils to understand the climate of northern Africa 130,000 years ago.

While that might sound a bit like relying on wooly bear caterpillars to predict the severity of winter, the snails actually reveal clues about the climate and environment of western Egypt, lo those many years ago. They also could shed light on the possible role weather and climate played in