Getting expertise where it is needed in wastewater treatment is the goal of TELEMAC, which has developed remote, and local monitoring and control solutions so industries can obtain all the benefits of anaerobic waste treatment while minimising costs and complications.

The TELEMAC system is currently being evaluated at three pilot sites ahead of extensive testing next year in preparation for commercialisation, potentially heralding a major boost for the use of anaerobic treatment, a cl

A leading biological scientist from the University of Southampton is warning of massive increases in the UK’s fly population if temperatures continue to rise.

Experts predict average temperatures will increase by three degrees or more within the next few years, if global warming continues across the planet. Dr Dave Goulson from the University’s School of Biological Sciences says this could mean the fly population growing by 97 per cent. He bases his predictions on work done at a landf

Ice sheet more susceptible to change than previously thought

Scientists have found a remarkable new structure deep within the West Antarctic Ice Sheet which suggests that the whole ice sheet is more susceptible to future change than previously thought. The discovery, by scientists from Bristol University and the British Antarctic Survey in collaboration with US colleagues, is reported this week (September 24) in the international journal Science.

The stability of the West

A team of 27 U.S. marine scientists beginning an intensive program of exploration at the Lau Basin in the South Pacific has discovered a new cluster of hydrothermal vents along a volcanically active crack in the seafloor. About a mile and a half down, the basin could hold answers to questions about the origin of life on Earth, say the scientists, whose plans for their “South Pacific Odyssey” include an unprecedented number of research expeditions to this geologically unique “back-arc basin” duri

With a strong enough jolt — a 7.6 -magnitude earthquake — the seafloor under Catalina Island could be violently thrust upward, causing a tsunami along the Southern California coast, according to researchers at the University of Southern California.

In a pair of journal articles published this month, researchers at the Viterbi School of Engineering described the tsunami hazard associated with offshore faults, including one that lies under Santa Catalina Island, just 25 miles off

ESA’s Earth Observation Programme Board met at the Eden Project in Cornwall on 21 and 22 September. An agreement was reached at this meeting among ESA’s Member States to release a total of €80m to fund the next stage of the ESA component of the European GMES (Global Monitoring for Environment and Security) initiative.

Part of this funding will cover a socioeconomic assessment of the benefits of GMES and the follow-on to the work already done by ESA on definition and demonstrati

A consortium of researchers, farmers and a major baker are working together to fill future supermarket shelves with loaves of bread that will arrest the plummeting levels in the UK diet of a mineral that plays a significant role in male fertility and the prevention of some cancers.

The mineral selenium is of particular importance to men with its role in male fertility and in the prevention of prostate cancer but research has also shown that it can help in the prevention of cardiovasc

Satellite image acquisitions will be synchronised with the tides as part of an ambitious new project to map coastlines from space.

Formally beginning in September, ESA’s COASTCHART project aims to develop and qualify a specialised coastline information system that provides satellite-derived coastal data products suitable for operational use by hydrographic organisations.
Accurate up-to-date marine charts are essential for safe shipping navigation. They also increasingly s

Heavy metals can trigger widely varying stress reactions in plants. A team at the Campus Vienna Biocenter was now able to provide evidence for this in a research funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF). The results, now awaiting publication, are an important basis to comprehend how plants cope with an increase in heavy metal concentrations in the soil – and how these abilities can be profitably utilised.

Adverse environmental conditions can cause enormous stress in plants. As sede

Scientists from Novosibirsk are engaged in the development of an unusual vaccine which, apart from being less expensive to produce, safe and painless to administer, is also edible. The research is being accomplished in the framework of the ISTC Partner Project #2176, which is funded by the Agricultural Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and so far the project team has managed to introduce a HIV antigen protein gene into tomatoes.

Usually, vaccines are injected,

The issue (31 august) of the US scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), one of the most prestigious in the world, carries an article on important aspects related to a molecule (ADPglucose) which is required for plants to produce starch.

In order to assess the importance of this research of the Public University of Navarre, two fundamental factors have to be taken into account: one is the annual production of starch derived from the main vegetables a

Contrary to general expectations, the characteristics of different varieties of perennial ryegrass such as sugar content do not influence the feed intake of grazing dairy cows. Moreover cell wall degradability characteristics were not different among perennial ryegrass varieties. Research carried out by the Palestinian researcher Hassan Z. H. Taweel at Wageningen University, Netherlands, shows that an increased dry matter intake can be achieved by gaining more insight into the regulatory mechanisms b

Forests cover 30% of the world’s land area, house two thirds of life on earth, and are responsible for 90% of the biomass on dry land. So, the impact of trees on our daily life is enormous. Now, an international consortium − which includes researchers from the Flanders Interuniversity Institute for Biotechnology (VIB) at Ghent University − has succeeded in deciphering the first tree genome, that of the poplar. Gaining knowledge of the poplar DNA is an important step in the research into ‘

Antarctic glaciers that had been blocked behind the Larsen B ice shelf have been flowing more rapidly into the Weddell Sea, following the break-up of that shelf. Studies based on imagery from two satellites reached similar conclusions, which will be published September 22 in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. Researchers from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colorado, and NASA’s Goddard Sp

In the future, global warming might not be as severe in the central United States as in other parts of the country, according to scientists at Saint Louis University and Iowa State University (ISU).

Using a detailed regional climate model, these researchers estimate summertime daily maximum temperatures will not climb as high in a Midwestern region — centered on the Missouri/Kansas border — as anywhere else in the United States. The hole stretches for hundreds of miles and inclu

Researchers at the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering of TU Delft have succeeded in modelling the rotational behaviour of two satellites with unprecedented accuracy. This makes it possible to model the orbit of the satellites much more accurately and this means that changes on earth observed by the satellite are also more accurate, for example, melting of the polar icecaps or the transport of water and atmospheric mass around the globe.

Satellites often have a rotational movement after