Environment – Page 166 – Shamskm: A site to exchange knowledge and solutions

Interior Releases First-of-its-Kind Regional Study as Part of National Assessment of Carbon Storage in U.S. Ecosystems

By Guest PostDecember 5, 2011Environmentassessment, carbon sequestration, carbon storage, great plains, underground rock formations

Report evaluates amount of carbon absorbed by wetlands, grasslands and forests in the Great Plains region

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Department of the Interior today released the first in a series of regional studies measuring the amount of carbon stored in U.S. ecosystems. Published by Interior’s U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the study examines the current and projected future carbon storage in the Great Plains region, as part of a nation-wide assessment. (more…)

Powerful Mathematical Model Greatly Improves Predictions for Species Facing Climate Change

By Guest PostDecember 4, 2011Environment, Nature, Scienceatmosphere and oceans, beetle, bridgett vonholdt, carbon dioxide emissions, coat color gene, coat color phenotype, daniel macnulty, daniel stahler, earth temperature, ecological impacts, ecological model, ecological parameters, ecosystem, Environment, environmental change, general model, genetics, global warming, gray wolf, grizzly bears, harmony, health of populations, heterozygotes, high arctic, integral projection model, ipm, mathematical model, new model, plants, polar bear, population ecology, population genetics, predictive model, quantitative genetics, robert wayne, species, sub fields of ecology, tim coulson, trophic cascade, wolf, wolf population, wolves, yellowstone, yellowstone national park

UCLA life scientists and colleagues have produced the most comprehensive mathematical model ever devised to track the health of populations exposed to environmental change.

The research, federally funded by the National Science Foundation, is published Dec. 2 in the journal Science.

The team’s groundbreaking integral projection model, or IPM, unites various sub-disciplines of population biology, including population ecology, quantitative genetics, population genetics, and life-span and offspring information, allowing researchers to link many different data sources simultaneously. Scientists can now change just a single variable, like temperature, and see how that affects many factors for a population. (more…)

E. Coli Bacteria Engineered to Eat Switchgrass and Make Transportation Fuels

By Guest PostDecember 4, 2011Environmentengineered bacteria, engineered escherichia coli, transportation fuels

Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) Researchers Reach Milestone on the Road to Biofuels

A milestone has been reached on the road to developing advanced biofuels that can replace gasoline, diesel and jet fuels with a domestically-produced clean, green, renewable alternative. (more…)

Yale-led Team Finds CO2 Levels Plunged as Antarctica Froze

By Guest PostDecember 3, 2011Environmentalgae, atmosphere, carbon dioxide levels, climate transition, co2 and climate change, critical condition, cryosphere, earth, eocene epoch, eocene to oligocene, freezing of antarctica, fundamental link, geochemist, global climate change, global cooling, greenhouse gases, ice sheets, icing of antarctica, mark pagani, matthew huber, molecules, oligocene, polar ice caps, robert m deconto, sea level, temperatures, yale university, zhonghui liu

A Yale University-led research team has found evidence that carbon dioxide levels in Earth’s atmosphere plunged prior to and during the initial icing of Antarctica, about 34 million years ago. The new findings provide further evidence of atmospheric carbon dioxide’s role as a major trigger of global climate change.

“CO2 is tracking global cooling at that time,” said Yale geochemist Mark Pagani, lead author of a paper published online Dec. 1 in the journal Science. “It’s important to demonstrate that there are obvious linkages between CO2 and climate change. It’s one more piece of evidence that CO2 is a primary lever on climate.” (more…)

Petroleum-eating Mushrooms

By Guest PostDecember 2, 2011Environmentcontaminated soil, crude petroleum, mushroom spores, petroleum eating mushrooms, phytoremediation, soil decontamination

Take a Petri dish containing crude petroleum and it will release a strong odor distinctive of the toxins that make up the fossil fuel. Sprinkle mushroom spores over the Petri dish and let it sit for two weeks in an incubator, and surprise, the petroleum and its smell will disappear. “The mushrooms consumed the petroleum!” says Mohamed Hijri, a professor of biological sciences and researcher at the University of Montreal’s Institut de recherche en biologie végétale (IRBV). (more…)

Minorities Pay More for Water and Sewer

By Guest PostNovember 29, 2011Culture, Environment, Generalbirmingham, bygone economic era, cleveland, detroit, environmental practice, michigan state university, pittsburgh, poster child, product of racism, rachel butts, racial minorities, sewer infrastructure, shrinking cities, st. louis, stephen gasteyer, structural inequality, wastewater, water and sewer

EAST LANSING, Mich. — Racial minorities pay systemically more for basic water and sewer services than white people, according to a study by Michigan State University researchers.

This “structural inequality” is not necessarily a product of racism, argues sociologist Stephen Gasteyer, but rather the result of whites fleeing urban areas and leaving minority residents to bear the costs of maintaining aging water and sewer infrastructure. (more…)

Chemistry Professor Links Faeces and Caffeine

By Guest PostNovember 28, 2011Environmentcaffeine sampling, fecal coliforms, fecal pollution, sanitary contamination, storm waters, traces of caffeine

Researchers led by Prof. Sébastien Sauvé of the University of Montreal’s Department of Chemistry have discovered that traces of caffeine are a useful indicator of the contamination of our water by sewers. (more…)

New Study Finds That Even the Cleanest Wastewater Contains ‘Super Bacteria’

By Guest PostNovember 27, 2011Environmentantibiotic resistance genes, antibiotic resistant bacteria, antibiotic use in agriculture, antibiotics, bacterial infections, david tan, duluth, duluth superior harbor, environmental microbiology, global ecology, industrial wastewater discharge, jessica eichmiller, lake superior, mi yan, municipal wastewater, municipal wastewater treatment facility, northeastern minnesota, patrick mcnamara, st louis river, superbacteria, surface waters, timothy lapara, treated municipal wastewater, treatment facility in duluth, tucker burch, university of minnesota

*University of Minnesota research suggests that wastewater treated with standard technologies contains far greater quantities*

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL — A new University of Minnesota study reveals that the release of treated municipal wastewater – even wastewater treated by the highest-quality treatment technology – can have a significant effect on the quantities of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, often referred to as “superbacteria,” in surface waters.

The study also suggests that wastewater treated using standard technologies probably contains far greater quantities of antibiotic-resistant genes, but this likely goes unnoticed because background levels of bacteria are normally much higher than in the water studied in this research. (more…)

Category Archives: Environment