Glacier lilies and broad-tailed hummingbirds out of sync
The glacier lily as it’s called, is a tall, willowy plant that graces mountain meadows throughout western North America. It flowers early in spring, when the first bumblebees and hummingbirds appear.
Or did.
The lily, a plant that grows best on subalpine slopes, is fast becoming a hothouse flower. In Earth’s warming temperatures, its first blooms appear some 17 days earlier than they did in the 1970s, scientists David Inouye and Amy McKinney of the University of Maryland and colleagues have found. (more…)
COLUMBUS, Ohio – For the first time, researchers have been able to combine different climate models using spatial statistics – to project future seasonal temperature changes in regions across North America.
They performed advanced statistical analysis on two different North American regional climate models and were able to estimate projections of temperature changes for the years 2041 to 2070, as well as the certainty of those projections.
The analysis, developed by statisticians at Ohio State University, examines groups of regional climate models, finds the commonalities between them, and determines how much weight each individual climate projection should get in a consensus climate estimate. (more…)
A series of papers published this month on ecological changes at 26 global research sites — including one administered by the University of Colorado Boulder in the high mountains west of the city — indicates that ecosystems dependent on seasonal snow and ice are the most sensitive to changes in climate.
The six papers appeared in the April issue of the journal BioScience. The papers were tied to data gathered at sites in North America, Puerto Rico, the island of Moorea near Tahiti, and Antarctica, which are known as Long-Term Ecological Research, or LTER, sites and are funded by the National Science Foundation. CU-Boulder’s Niwot Ridge site, one of the five original LTER sites designated by NSF in 1980, encompasses several thousand acres of subalpine forest, tundra, talus slopes, glacial lakes and wetlands stretching up to more than 13,000 feet on top of the Continental Divide. (more…)
*UCLA-launched partnership identifies genes that boost or lessen risk of brain atrophy, mental illness, Alzheimer’s disease*
In the world’s largest brain study to date, a team of more than 200 scientists from 100 institutions worldwide collaborated to map the human genes that boost or sabotage the brain’s resistance to a variety of mental illnesses and Alzheimer’s disease.
Published April 15 in the advance online edition of the journal Nature Genetics, the study also uncovers new genes that may explain individual differences in brain size and intelligence. (more…)
*Increase in ocean acidification led to collapse of oyster seed production at Oregon hatchery*
Marine researchers have definitively linked the collapse of oyster seed production at a commercial oyster hatchery in Oregon to an increase in ocean acidification.
Larval growth at the hatchery declined to a level considered by the owners to be “non-economically viable.”
A study by the scientists found that increased seawater carbon dioxide (CO2) levels, resulting in more corrosive ocean water, inhibited the larval oysters from developing their shells and growing at a pace that would make commercial production cost-effective. (more…)
*Anthropology Helps Us Understand the Past and Allows for a Deeper Understanding of the Future.*
COLUMBIA, Mo. — For more than a century and a half, scientists and tourists have visited massive animal-shaped mounds, such as Serpent Mound in Ohio, created by the indigenous people of North America. But few animal effigy mounds had been found in South America until University of Missouri anthropology professor emeritus Robert Benfer identified numerous earthen animals rising above the coastal plains of Peru, a region already renowned for the Nazca lines, the ruined city of Chan Chan, and other cultural treasures.
“The mounds will draw tourists, one day,” Benfer said. “Some of them are more than 4,000 years old. Compare that to the effigy mounds of North America, which date to between 400 and 1200 AD. The oldest Peruvian mounds were being built at the same time as the pyramids in Egypt.” (more…)
*Fans of the upcoming movie “The Hunger Games” can visit the fictional nation of Panem and immerse themselves into its futuristic Capitol city by visiting a new Internet Explorer 9 website powered by HTML5.*
REDMOND, Wash. – March 20, 2012 – The pages of the bestselling trilogy “The Hunger Games” introduced readers to a captivating set of characters living in a post-apocalyptic world, and on Friday the movie adaptation of the first book will bring that world to life.
Thanks to a partnership between Microsoft’s Internet Explorer team and Lionsgate, fans of The Hunger Games can dive in and experience the world of Panem and its opulent and oppressive Capitol city today. (more…)
