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A study has shown that genetically modified salmon that breed with wild trout can produce a fast-growing, competitive fish that not only screws around with the local ecosystem, but because it also alters the fish genome in ways which cannot be anticipated. What do you get when you cross a genetically modified salmon and wild […]
It’s no surprise that Germany is just giving lessons in terms of managing renewable energy sources – year after year, the country features more and more cities and now, even villages, which harness most of their energy from renewable sources. Wildpoldsried, a municipality in the district of Oberallgäu in Bavaria has a population of only […]
Hydrogen fuel has been eyeballed by scientists, as well as governments and energy corporations, for many years now as a potential alternative fuel source because of its incredibly high energy. It’s hard to imagine any other non-carbon fuel source capable of driving rockets or high velocity vehicles, like formula 1 sports cars. Besides it being […]
Rodents are able to move their eyes in different directions, thus always keeping an eye on the the airspace above them, researchers from Max Planck Institute have shown. Using miniaturised high-speed cameras and high-speed behavioural tracking, they found that rats can move their eyes in different directions, both in the horizontal and in the vertical […]
It’s the Middle Ages, the 1600s, and the Little Ice Age is striking the planet. The Little Ice Age, as the name describes it pretty much was a period of cooling that occurred after the Medieval Warm Period (Medieval Climate Optimum). It is usually described as lasting from the 16th to the 19th centuries, but […]
Here we go: once again, Colorado’s fracking boom raised fears that something dangerous will be leaked in the water, and what do you know? Carcinogenic benzene it is! A plant for fracked natural gas processor Williams Energy, near Parachute, Colo., spilled an estimated 241 barrels of mixed natural gas liquid into the ground, some of […]
Two generations from now, the over 9 billion people which are likely to walk the face of the planet will face dramatic water shortage, as climate change, pollution and overusage of resources start taking their toll, a group of 500 researchers warns. The thing is, if we, as a society continue developing at the same […]
Last week, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization suggested that consuming edible insects can not only fight world hunger and help secure the global food supply, but also reduce greenhouse gases, and help save the environment. As far fetched and sci-fi that idea may sound, it’s not really as crazy as it sounds. 2 […]
In case you didn’t know, bee popullations all around the world are dwindling. The disorder which is causing this massive decline in bee numbers is called CCD – colony collapse disorder. In 2012 alone, a phenomenon called colony collapse disorder (CCD) wiped out about half of honeybee hives [read more here]. What happens in CCD […]
Penguins are remarkable animals that have always garnered attention. For one they’re extremely cute (always an advantage in a world where humans are at the absolute top of the food chain), then they’re extremely fascinating to study. If you’re to closely look at the wings of a penguin, intuition would immediately tell you that these […]
Renewable energy sources, like wind and solar, are gaining ground fast against fossil fuels in terms of energy production, but unfortunately not that fast as we’d hoped for. One big obstacle in the way of renewable energy is storage. A refined look at an older idea that dates back from the XIX century seeks to […]
When you think about a spider, you usually imagine a big, silky, web used to trap unfortunate insects. But a new study conducted by biologists of the Kiel University and the University of Bern has shown that about half of all spiders have found an alternative to that and don’t use web at all. These […]
In April, the Russian space agency launched the Bion-M craft which carried quite a few mice, gerbils, newts, snails and some microfauna into Earth’s orbit. The experiment was designed to test how weightlesness affect them and how these organisms adapt in the process. The craft returned back to Earth on May 19th in an otherwise […]
Buried deep at some 2.4 kilometers beneath the surface, in the vicinity of an underground mine near Ontario, Canada, scientists have stumbled across what may actually be the oldest water on Earth. Isolated for more than a billion years, the water pocket holds invaluable clues that may hint how ancient life formed, while also shinning hope that […]
Serving as one of the strongest metaphors nature has to offer, at the later stages of its evolution the caterpillar - a soft bodied, not very pretty, ground based insect - morphs into a butterfly - a majestic flying insect of varying coloring and shape. What exactly goes inside the chrysalis the caterpillar wraps itself with for the many weeks required for metamorphosis remains a mystery, though.
A bit late with on this story, but considering the importance of this rather unfortunate milestone, it’s best you all hear it again. On the 9th of May NOAA reported CO2 levels of 400.03 parts per million (ppm), which is a level unseen for three million years. This is the first time in human history that atmospheric […]
Researchers at the Cambridge-based National Institute of Agricultural Botany have cross-bred an ancient species of wheat with a modern variant to produce a new strain that is not only stronger (i.e. more resistant to pests), but which also yields a higher productivity. Preliminary tests found the ‘superwhat’ could outperform modern wheat variants by as much as […]
With the world’s population hitting the magic seven billion a mere few years ago, new solutions are required to feed the growing number of hungry people, estimated at being almost one billion strong at the moment or one in every seven people being hungry, according to the World Hunger Education Service. A panel of experts […]
A matter of great debate and ardent discussion in the field of evolutionary biology today is the transition of complex life from a watery environment to land. So far, there have been numerous speculations put forward in attempt to explain how tetrapods (four-legged land animals) first evolved and washed ashore to start life fresh as […]
A new study that examined ice core samples found that parts of Antarctica‘s ice are melting at at the highest pace this millennium. The findings put modern global warming into a historical context emphasizing the link between human induced climate change and rapid ice melting in the Arctic, considering it has increased tenfold since the dawn […]
In the 1980s a report described how a ginormous patch of plastic trash was guided by currents and concentrated right in the middle of the Pacific Ocean in an area that some estimated as being roughly two times the size of Texas. Naturally, people all over the world were outraged, but I guess it didn’t last too […]
Scientists have always tried to answer how speech developed in humans or what are its evolutionary mechanisms, a mystery made even more difficult to unravel since none of our close primate relatives has been granted with even the most primitive forms of speech, or so it was thought. Researchers studying the gelada – a primate […]
Possibly the most exciting technological innovation of the decade, in terms of the impact it’s projected to have, 3-D printing never seems ceasing to amaze us with its unrivaled potential. We’ve seen 3-D printed titanium jaw bones for implants, nanoscale F-1 cars, an ear or live tissue by 3-D printing of stem cells. A number of […]
Unborn lizards can erupt from their eggs days before they should if they recept vibrations that hint at a predator coming. The premature hatchlings literally begin their life by running as fast as they can. Talk about having an escape plan! The fact that lizards can have such spectacular survival reflexes even before they are […]
A paleoclimate study has shown that a huge mass of warm water stretched out from Indonesia over to Africa and South America four million years ago had a huge impact on tropical changes, suggesting that current climate models are a too conservative. The Pliocene era started 5.332 million years ago and lasted until 2.588 million […]
An often overlooked aspect of climate change is the migration of the traditionally-viewed climate line that separates the Northern and the Southern hemispheres, as the Northern is becoming warmer than the South. The consequences are deeply rooted, yet poorly studied. A recent study by climatologists from the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Washington, […]
In case you don’t know, global bee populations have been dropping dramatically in latest years – and this is not an exaggeration. In 2012 alone, a phenomenon called colony collapse disorder (CCD) wiped out about half of honeybee hives. What happens in CCD is that bees just leave the hive, never to return again. This […]
Just 9% of the millions of tonnes of fish caught by China’s giant fishing fleet in international waters (most notably in Africa) is reported to the UN. Overfishing is one of the most serious issues mankind is facing – people don’t really understand that aquatic resources are not neverending, and this is probably the kind […]
Our close primate relatives, chimpanzees, have been constantly amazing us with their incredible cognitive abilities and personality traits that are so similar to our own. If you believe much of what you undertake today is limited to human cognition only, think again. Chimps do it too – thinking about thinking that is, as the findings […]
A Sri Lanka researcher has discovered a new tarantula species, and it’s literally a big deal. Spanning across eight inches, this tarantula is big enough to cover your entire face and boasts a unique coloring. Ranil Nanayakkara, a local researcher, along with his team found the tiger stripped arachnid while on a typical arachnid expedition […]
In the past few years a relatively new field of science has surfaced into mainstream discussions, especially those concerning biodiversity and nature conservation – synthetic biology. Some are simply ecstatic of its progress and findings, while others are simply terrified by some of its potential consequences. In an attempt to address the issue, albeit from […]
Usually, the military taps into what science does and uses its technologies – but for once, it was the other way around. Using unmannes planes typically designed for city warfare, scientists were able to keep track of toxic volcanic fumes. The Dragon Eye remote-controlled plane weighs in at just under 6 pounds (2.7 kilograms), with […]
The gecko is a phenomenal reptile which has always amazed observers, and especially scientists, thanks to its remarkable ability to cling to surfaces. Though they’ve been studied for a while now, it’s only recently that researchers have learned how geckos scale across wet surfaces, like leaves and trees found in its natural tropical environment. The […]
Especially after the Fukushima events, nuclear energy has been painted black by most of the media, with everybody suddenly realizing just how dangerous and not really desirable it is. But a recent report conducted by NASA showed that as a matter of fact, nuclear energy leads to substantially fewer pollution-related deaths and greenhouse gas emissions […]
In a society that attempts to pass from an opulent attitude towards consumption to a much more temperate, health-centered one, biases can easily make their way through and distort reality. It’s quite easy too, considering the amount of confusion that seems to be floating in the air. A good example for this is the “health […]
A recent study led by WCS-India scientist Vidya Athreaya finds that certain areas in India, in which human settlements have greatly expanded, and which, as a result, are basically devoid of wilderness are teeming with another type of backyard wildlife: leopards. Camera traps set up at night in a densely populated region of India virtually […]
A new study stresses the overlooked hazards that dumped pharmaceuticals found in wastewater pose to the world’s freshwater streams. So far, the impacts and consequences on water quality and aquatic life are unknown or under researched, and the authors hope their findings might warrant more work in this direction. Dr. Emma Rosi-Marshall, lead author of […]
Overgrowth of invasive algae can have huge detrimental effects both on the environment and on human activities. This is quite clearly observed in lake Erie, where a study published by the National Academy of Sciences documents some serious problems. Farmers and the environment According to Anna Michalak, the study’s co-author and a researcher at the […]
A while ago, we wrote about the ongoing efforts to pinpoint the cause that gives rise to the thousands of so called “fairy circles” scattered around hundreds of square miles from the edge of the Namib Desert in Angola to South Africa. These great rings of grass that cover whole patches of arid desert have […]
For some years now, scientists have been exploring the use of quantum dots as the basis for a novel type of solar cell. The advantages over conventional solar photovoltaic cells are numerous, minus one aspect: efficiency, which is actually the most important one. A new technique developed at MIT labs that uses quantum dots in […]
The misinformation going on in some fields of science is just staggering. For example, I woke up today to see my email, Facebook and even phone filled with messages about this new discovery that can use the CO2 in the atmosphere and transform it into biofuel. My first take on that was “Cool, a plant”. […]
The Peruvian capital of Lima, along with its outskirts, is plagued by a vicious drought, which coupled with pollution and unsanitary water extraction methods, has made the water there stagnant, dirty and dangerous. Doing what they know best – fix problems – engineers at Peru’s University for Engineering and Technology have devised an resourceful system that […]
It’s important to understand that our planet’s climate consists of so much interconnected elements, that what happens someplace affects virtually the entire Earth. Thing is, few people realize the huge impact the warming in the Arctic has on global climate. At a news conference held on Tuesday, several researchers said that the melting ice may […]
The Iberian lynx is the only wild cat listed as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), numbering no more than 200 specimens, all of whom are entirely confined to southern Spain. Researchers from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (IZW) in Berlin recently salvaged embryos and egg cells from a pair of captive […]
It’s Chevron’s third oil spill in three years in Utah alone; a June 2010 spill involved more than 30,000 gallons of crude oil near Red Butte Gardens in Salt Lake City, while a December 2010 leak near the same site involved about 21,000 gallons. This time, the spill was originally thought to be 27,000 gallons, […]
A new study sheds new light on the impact humans had on the local aviary fauna in the Pacific, after the authors conclude that human colonization of the Pacific Islands is the main driving factor that wiped out some 1,300 bird species in the area or roughly 10% of the entire bird population on the […]
You’ve probably heard it a few times: the climate is indeed warming up, but it’s all good, because the rate at which it is warming up is slowing down. But a new study published in Geophysical Research Letters analyzing ocean warming (which represents 90% of global warming) claims otherwise. Accelerating global warming Contrary to the […]
What do you get when you cross a grizzly bear with a polar bear? Simple, a prizzly bear or golar bear, depending on the side you’re looking from. What about a narwhal with a beluga whale? A narluga! No, these aren’t childish word plays, nor elaborated photoshop attempts – these animals truly exist and come […]
One of the biggest hurdles the solar energy industry currently faces is efficiently transforming the incoming energy from the sun’s rays. Vast fields of solar panels are a common sight, but truth of the matter is their energy output is quite low, which puts them at a technical and economic disadvantage from other renewable solutions […]
Great tits are widespread species throughout Europe, the Middle East, Central and Northern Asia, and parts of North Africa in any sort of woodland. They tipically don’t migrate, except for very harsh winters. According to a new paper published in BioMed Central’s open access journal Frontiers in Zoology, the female’s appearance can be correlated with […]
