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Ocean’s most oxygen-deprived zones to shrink under climate change

By Guest PostNovember 2, 2014Environmentclimate change, curtis deutsch, indian ocean, kranke zellen, krebszellen, low oxygen waters, Mexico, nanomedikamente, nitrogen, ocean, peru, prediction, shrink, steifigkeit, university of washington, western australia, wolgang haak

As the complex story of climate change unfolds, many of the endings are grim. But there are exceptions. Predictions that the lowest-oxygen environments in the ocean would get worse may not come to pass. Instead, University of Washington research shows climate change, as it weakens the trade winds, could shrink the size of these extreme low-oxygen waters.

“The tropics should actually get better oxygenated as the climate warms up,” said Curtis Deutsch, a UW associate professor of oceanography. He is lead author of the study published Aug. 8 in Science. (more…)

Shrinking Snow Depth on Arctic Sea Ice Threatens Ringed Seal Habitat

By Guest PostSeptember 20, 2012EnvironmentArctic, atmospheric sciences, brendan kelly, cecilia bitz, climate change, climate model, ice, important factor, paul hezel, predict, pups, sea ice, seals, shrink, snowfall pattern, thermodynamic impact, thickness, university, Washington

As sea ice in the Arctic continues to shrink during this century, more than two thirds of the area with sufficient snow cover for ringed seals to reproduce also will disappear, challenging their survival, scientists report in a new study.

The ringed seal, currently under consideration for threatened species listing, builds caves to rear its young in snow drifts on sea ice. Snow depths must be on average at least 20 centimeters, or 8 inches, to enable drifts deep enough to support the caves. (more…)

Yale Team Discovers How Stress and Depression Can Shrink the Brain

By Guest PostAugust 20, 2012Health, Scienceanimal model, antidepressant therapy, ashley lepack, bhavya voleti, brain, brain cell, brain mass, brain volume, chronic stress, cognitive impairment, depression, emotional, gata1, gene, gene activation, genetic switch, h j kang, mounira banasr, pattern, pawel licznerski, prefrontal cortex, ronald duman, shrink, stress, symptoms of depression, synaptic connection, transcription factor, yale

Major depression or chronic stress can cause the loss of brain volume, a condition that contributes to both emotional and cognitive impairment. Now a team of researchers led by Yale scientists has discovered one reason why this occurs — a single genetic switch that triggers loss of brain connections in humans and depression in animal models.

The findings, reported in the Aug. 12 issue of the journal Nature Medicine, show that the genetic switch known as a transcription factor represses the expression of several genes that are necessary for the formation of synaptic connections between brain cells, which in turn could contribute to loss of brain mass in the prefrontal cortex. (more…)

West Antarctic Ice Shelves Tearing Apart at the Seams

By Guest PostMarch 29, 2012Environmentamundsen sea embayment, cyclical calving, ginny catania, glacier, glacier acceleration, google earth, ice shelves, iceberg, joseph macgregor, landsat satellite, loss of ice, pine island glaciers, rifting and retreat, satellite imagery, sea, shrink, thwaites, west antarctica

AUSTIN, Texas — A new study examining nearly 40 years of satellite imagery has revealed that the floating ice shelves of a critical portion of West Antarctica are steadily losing their grip on adjacent bay walls, potentially amplifying an already accelerating loss of ice to the sea.

The most extensive record yet of the evolution of the floating ice shelves in the eastern Amundsen Sea Embayment in West Antarctica shows that their margins, where they grip onto rocky bay walls or slower ice masses, are fracturing and retreating inland. As that grip continues to loosen, these already-thinning ice shelves will be even less able to hold back grounded ice upstream, according to glaciologists at The University of Texas at Austin’s Institute for Geophysics (UTIG). (more…)

Tag Archives: shrink

Ocean’s most oxygen-deprived zones to shrink under climate change

Shrinking Snow Depth on Arctic Sea Ice Threatens Ringed Seal Habitat

Yale Team Discovers How Stress and Depression Can Shrink the Brain

West Antarctic Ice Shelves Tearing Apart at the Seams