Biology News Net - Environment

Ethanol byproduct produces green results

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 15:59:32 -0500

Commercial flower and plant growers know all too well that invasive, ubiquitous weeds cause trouble by lowering the value and deterring healthy growth of potted ornamental plants. To control weeds, many commercial nursery owners resort to the expensive practice of paying workers to hand-weed containers. Some growers use herbicides, but efficacy of herbicides is questionable on the wide range of plant species produced in nurseries, and many herbicides are not registered for use in greenhouses.

Shrinking carbon footprints

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 14:30:13 -0500

Would shrinking your carbon footprint, recycling more, and going green be easier if you could monitor your household's environmental impact? That's the question a team of Canadian industry consultants set out to answer. They report their findings in a forthcoming issue of the International Journal of Environmental Technology and Management from Inderscience Publishers.

Penguins setting off sirens over health of world's oceans

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 14:30:13 -0500

Rain has soaked this Adélie penguin chick in Antarctica before its feathers are capable of repelling water. Though the icy continent is in essence a desert, coastal rainfall is becoming more common with changing climate. Credit: Dee Boersma Like the proverbial canary in the coal mine, penguins are sounding the alarm for potentially catastrophic changes in the world's oceans, and the culprit isn't only climate change, says a University of Washington conservation biologist.

Ancient oak trees help reduce global warming

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 21:06:08 -0500

The battle to reduce carbon emissions is at the heart of many eco-friendly efforts, and researchers from the University of Missouri have discovered that nature has been lending a hand. Researchers at the Missouri Tree Ring Laboratory in the Department of Forestry discovered that trees submerged in freshwater aquatic systems store carbon for thousands of years, a significantly longer period of time than trees that fall in a forest, thus keeping carbon out of the atmosphere.

Climate change causing significant shift in composition of coastal fish communities

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 21:06:08 -0500

A detailed analysis of data from nearly 50 years of weekly fish-trawl surveys in Narragansett Bay and adjacent Rhode Island Sound has revealed a long-term shift in species composition, which scientists attribute primarily to the effects of global warming.

Database shows effects of acid rain on microorganisms in Adirondack Lakes

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 16:10:24 -0500

Prior to the federal Clean Air Act, unhindered industrial emissions were released into the air throughout the Midwestern and Eastern United States for decades. Many of those harmful chemicals came right back down to earth in the form of acid rain, a chemical concoction that includes nitric and sulfuric acid.

Desert plant may hold key to surviving food shortage

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 20:48:40 -0500

The plant, Kalanchoe fedtschenkoi, is unique because, unlike normal plants, it captures most of its carbon dioxide at night when the air is cooler and more humid, making it 10 times more water-efficient than major crops such as wheat. Scientists will use the latest next-generation DNA sequencing to analyse the plant's genetic code and understand how these plants function at night.

Researchers explain nitrogen paradox in forests

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:08:16 -0500

Nitrogen is essential to all life on Earth, and the processes by which it cycles through the environment may determine how ecosystems respond to global warming. But certain aspects of the nitrogen cycle in temperate and tropical forests have puzzled scientists, defying, in a sense, the laws of supply and demand. Trees capable of extracting nitrogen directly from the atmosphere often thrive where it is readily available in the soil, but not where it is in short supply. Now scientists from the Carnegie Institution have explained the paradox by recognizing the role of two other factors: temperature and the abundance of another key element, phosphorous.

Mini subs to probe odd structures in BC lake

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 18:34:41 -0500

Single person submersibles have been called in to help scientists retrieve samples from a lake in northern British Columbia that may hold vital clues to the history of life on Earth and on other planets.

Even the Antarctic winter cannot protect Wilkins Ice Shelf

Fri, 13 Jun 2008 12:23:51 -0500

Wilkins Ice Shelf has experienced further break-up with an area of about 160 square kilometers breaking off. This animation, comprised of images acquired by Envisat's Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar between May 30 and June 9, 2008, highlights the rapidly dwindling strip of ice that is protecting thousands of kilometers of the ice shelf from further break-up. This is the first ever-documented episode to occur in winter. Credit: ESA Wilkins Ice Shelf has experienced further break-up with an area of about 160 km² breaking off from 30 May to 31 May 2008. ESA's Envisat satellite captured the event – the first ever-documented episode to occur in winter.