Drawing on experiments with blue jays, a team of University of Minnesota researchers has found what may be the evolutionary basis for impulsive behavior. Such behavior may have evolved because in the wild, snatching up small rewards like food morsels rather than waiting for something bigger and better to come along can lead to getting more rewards in the long run. The work may help explain why many modern-day humans find it so hard to turn down an immediate reward–for example, food, money, sex o

It is hard to overstate the scale of the humanitarian emergency unfolding in Sudan’s strife-torn Darfur region: by current estimates there are 1.45 million people displaced from their homes across an area the size of France. However, images from space are assisting aid workers as they cope with the crisis.

An ESA-supported consortium called Respond is supplying Earth Observation-derived maps and other geographical information products direct to users in the field including

SEATURTLE.ORG has announced a new fund raiser to support sea turtle research and conservation in Africa. The African Sea Turtle Fund will be a small, competitive grants fund, with initial grants limited to activities along Africa’s Atlantic coast. The goal is to raise $10,000, and one lucky contributor will win a brand new Apple iPod photo. Six species of sea turtles (loggerheads, leatherbacks, greens, hawksbills, olive ridleys, and Kemp’s ridleys) are found along the Atla

Exposure to organochlorine chemicals is linked to reduced bone mineral density among polar bears from East Greenland, according to a study published today in the December issue of the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP). In the study of 139 polar bear skulls, researchers compared 41 samples collected between 1892 and 1932 with 98 samples collected between 1961 and 2002. Bone mineral density in the skulls collected before 1932—considered “pre-pollution” by the researcher

University of Leeds and Cambridge research into climate change, published today (December 2nd) in Science Express, reveals that there is no regular pattern in the duration of warm phases (interglacials) on land over the last 350,000 years. This raises doubts over our ability to predict when the onset of the next ice age might occur.

For over 30 years it’s been thought that interglacials lasted about 10,000 years. On this basis, our current interglacial, already 11,500 years old, would appe

The world’s fastest glacier, Greenland’s Jakobshavn Isbrae, doubled its speed between 1997 and 2003. The rapid movement of ice from land into the sea provides key evidence of newly discovered relationships between ice sheets, sea level rise and climate warming.

The findings were reported in the journal Nature on December 2, 2004. Co-authoring the study was University of New Hampshire glaciologist Mark Fahnestock of the Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans, and Space (

A spectacular new discovery from an ongoing excavation at the Teotihuacan’s Pyramid of the Moon is revealing a grisly sacrificial burial from a period when the ancient metropolis was at its peak, with artwork unlike any seen before in Mesoamerica.

Though archaeologists hope that discoveries at the pyramid will answer lingering questions about the distinctive culture that built the great city, the new find deepens the mystery, with clear cultural connections to other burial

The European Union is becoming increasingly strict in its rules governing recycling in the automobile branch, but there seems to be little or no theoretical foundation for these rules. Antoinette van Schaik concludes this in her PhD thesis on car recycling, which she will defend on 8 December at TU Delft.

Van Schaik finds the EU’s demand of 85 percent recycling far too general. Moreover, the measurement and calculation methods used to calculate the percentage are far too simplist

A complex farming society developed in Uruguay around 4,800 to 4,200 years ago, much earlier that previously thought, Iriarte and his colleagues report in this week’s Nature (December 2). Researchers had assumed that the large rivers system called the La Plata Basin was inhabited by simple groups of hunters and gatherers for much of the pre-Hispanic era.

Iriarte and coauthors excavated an extensive mound complex, called Los Ajos, in the wetlands of southeastern Uruguay. They

International network reaches 1,500th float deployment-halfway to full array

Note: This news release is issued in conjunction with the Group on Earth Observations (GEO-5) and the Partnership for Observation of the Global Oceans (POGO-6) international meetings held the week of Nov. 29, 2004.

Scientists have crossed an important threshold in an international effort to deploy a global network of robotic instruments to monitor and investigate important changes in the world’s oc

Scientists studied the winds and rains in the eastern Indian Ocean for hints at developing El Ninos. They used that information to create an “Index” or gauge that accurately predicted the El Nino of 2002-2003.

El Nino is signaled by a warming of the ocean surface off the western coast of South America that occurs every 4 to 12 years when cold, nutrient-rich water does not come up from the ocean bottom. It causes die-offs of plankton and fish and affects Pacific jet stream winds,

Concerns about greenhouse gases and global warming are getting scientists to think in unconventional ways about how to stem the carbon dioxide tide. Indiana University Bloomington geologist Chen Zhu is trying to determine if — and how — a new strategy known as “carbon sequestration” can work.

Zhu and other scientists believe it may be possible to grab carbon dioxide before it shoots out of power plant smokestacks, diverting it to geological carbon sinks that trap carbon dioxide foreve

With increasing global warming Rudolph and the rest of Santa Claus’ reindeer will disappear from large portions of their current range and be under severe environmental stress by the end of the century.

That finding comes from a new study that examined the archaeological record in southwestern France, where reindeer became locally extinct during two earlier episodes of warming roughly 10,000 and 130,000 years ago.

“There will be a direct impact of increases in su

Northeastern environmental scientist finding could improve global warming forecast models

A Northeastern University researcher today announced that he has found that the soil below oak trees exposed to elevated levels of carbon dioxide had significantly higher carbon levels than those exposed to ambient carbon levels. The findings are consistent with the hypothesis that elevated carbon dioxide levels are increasing carbon storage in terrestrial ecosystems and slowing the build-up

A number of emerging forest health issues are affecting the overall vitality of North American forests, say plant pathologists with The American Phytopathological Society (APS).

At a recent APS Northeastern Division meeting, plant pathologists highlighted several types of diseases that are of growing concern, including:

Butternut Canker

First reported in Wisconsin in 1967, butternut canker is a fast moving, virulent disease that is killing butternut t

The December issue of GEOLOGY covers a wide variety of potentially newsworthy subjects. Topics include: impact of shifts in the North Atlantic current on European climate; new method for estimating elevations of Earth’s ancient land surfaces; evidence of terrestrial causes of the Permian-Triassic mass extinction; evidence of a major Precambrian asteroid impact in northwestern Australia; the relationship of intensified hydrologic cycles and global heat transfer during greenhouse phases of E