Tag Archives: deserts

Close Family Ties Keep Microbial Cheaters in Check, Study Finds

*Experiments on “slime mold” explain why almost all multicellular organisms begin life as a single cell*

Any multicellular animal, from a blue whale to a human being, poses a special challenge for evolution.

Most of the cells in its body will die without reproducing; only a privileged few will pass their genes to the next generation.

How could the extreme degree of cooperation required by multicellular existence actually evolve? Why aren’t all creatures unicellular individualists determined to pass on their own genes? (more…)

Read More

Between the Nightmare of the Gulf and the Magic of Solar Impulse

While the BP Deepwater Horizon well spits tens of thousands of barrels of oil offshore on the Gulf of Mexico, an environmental disaster of proportions never before imagined, a beautiful new kind of bird flies silently in the skies on its first test flight. 

(more…)

Read More

Sandstorms and desertification

Saturday, and again on Monday (22nd March) Beijing and part of eastern China was hit by two successive severe sandstorms originating in northern China. And the fine dust travelled not only to Taiwan, but as far as to the western United States.

(more…)

Read More