New DNA dataset is potent, accessible tool
Oak Ridge TN (SPX) Apr 16, 2015 -
Scientists focused on producing biofuels more efficiently have a new powerful dataset to help them study the DNA of microbes that fuel bioconversion and other processes.
In a paper published in Nature Scientific Data, researchers from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, North Carolina State University and LanzaTech describe methods and results for sequencing the Clost ...
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Meningitis epidemic kills 75 in Niger
Niamey (AFP) April 16, 2015 -
A meningitis epidemic that broke out in January in Niger has killed 75 people so far, the health minister said on Thursday.
The total number of nationwide cases currently stand at 697, the minister Mano Aghali said on state television.
More than half of the deaths have occurred in the capital Niamey but the epidemic has spread to all regions of the country, with the exception of southeas ...
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Indian village gets 'world's cheapest bottled water'
Madhusudankati, India (AFP) April 16, 2015 -
Charity workers have teamed with an impoverished village in eastern India to develop what they say is the world's cheapest bottle of drinking water - costing less than one US cent.
After years of suffering illnesses from drinking polluted ground water, residents of Madusudankati are now receiving clean bottled supplies thanks to a new purification plant.
"I saw a ray of hope when I hea ...
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Mexico boosts protection of near-extinct porpoise
Mexico City (AFP) April 16, 2015 -
Mexico is greatly expanding a protected area of the Gulf of California and boosting navy patrols in an effort to save the vaquita marina, a small porpoise facing imminent extinction.
A report by a panel of international scientists warned last year that there were fewer than 100 vaquitas remaining, down from 200 specimens in 2012, and the animal could vanish by 2018.
The dire warning prom ...
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'Volcano of Fire' spews ash on Mexican city
Mexico City (AFP) April 16, 2015 -
Mexico's Colima volcano spewed a giant 3.5-kilometer-high (two miles) column of ash on Thursday that rained down on a nearby city, authorities said.
The Jalisco state civil protection agency said a "moderate" quantity of ash fell on Ciudad Guzman, a town near the western state of Colima, where the volcano is located.
A civil protection official said there were no reports of damage or inj ...
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Researchers discover transitional stem cells
Columbia, Mo. (UPI) Apr 16, 2015 -
While studying pre-eclampsia, a disease that affects pregnant women, researchers at the University of Missouri happened upon a new type of human embryonic stem cell.
They say the previously unknown type of transitional stem cell will help advance research on pre-eclampsia and other little-understood reproductive disorders.
"These new cells, which we are calling bone morphogenetic ...
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Study puts a price on help nature provides agriculture
Pullman, WA (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
A team of international scientists has shown that assigning a dollar value to the benefits nature provides agriculture improves the bottom line for farmers while protecting the environment. The study confirms that organic farming systems do a better job of capitalizing on nature's services.
Scientists from Australia, Denmark, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States describe t ...
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Bacterial raincoat discovery paves way to better crop protection
Edinburgh UK (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
Fresh insights into how bacteria protect themselves - by forming a waterproof raincoat - could help develop improved products to protect plants from disease.
Researchers have discovered how communities of beneficial bacteria form a waterproof coating on the roots of plants, to protect them from microbes that could potentially cause plant disease.
Their insights could lead to ways to ...
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Wildfires emit more greenhouse gases than assumed
Berkeley CA (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
A new study quantifying the amount of carbon stored and released through California forests and wildlands finds that wildfires and deforestation are contributing more than expected to the state's greenhouse gas emissions.
The findings, published online, in the journal Forest Ecology and Management, came from a collaborative project led by the National Park Service and the University of Cal ...
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Maize roots have evolved to be more nitrogen efficient
University Park PA (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
Selective breeding of maize over the last century to create hybrids with desirable shoot characteristics and increased yield may have contributed indirectly to the evolution of root systems that are more efficient in acquiring nutrients, such as nitrogen, from the soil, according to researchers.
Their results suggest that future breeding efforts that directly select for positive root trait ...
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Iceberg armadas not the cause of North Atlantic cooling
Cardiff, UK (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
Previous studies have suggested that pulses of icebergs may have caused cycles of abrupt climate change during the last glacial period by introducing fresh water to the surface of the ocean and changing ocean currents, which are known to play a dominant role in the climate of many of Earth's regions.
However, new findings by scientists at Cardiff University present a contradictory narrativ ...
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Discovery changes how scientists examine rarest elements of periodic table
Tallahassee FL (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
A little-known element called californium is making big waves in how scientists look at the periodic table. According to new research by a Florida State University professor, californium is what's known to be a transitional element, meaning it links one part of the Periodic Table of Elements to the next.
b>Why's that important? br> /b>
Despite the fact that you may have memorized the per ...
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Dwindling bird populations in Fukushima
Columbia SC (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
This is the time of year when birds come out and really spread their wings, but since a disastrous day just before spring's arrival four years ago, Japan's Fukushima province has not been friendly to the feathered. And as several recent papers from University of South Carolina biologist Tim Mousseau and colleagues show, the avian situation there is just getting worse.
Since a few months af ...
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Killer asteroid may have made solid earth splash like water
Moscow (Sputnik) Apr 17, 2015 -
While scientists understand that a 6-mile wide asteroid plummeted to the Earth over 65 million years ago, creating a 110-mile wide crater and killing all the dinosaurs, researchers want to get to the bottom of what the site looked like directly after impact.
Next year scientists will be drilling 5,000 feet below the surface of the Chicxulub crater, just off Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, know ...
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Longest mammal migration raises questions about distinct species
Newport OR (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
A team of scientists from the United States and Russia has documented the longest migration of a mammal ever recorded - a round-trip trek of nearly 14,000 miles by a whale identified as a critically endangered species that raises questions about its status.
The researchers used satellite-monitored tags to track three western North Pacific gray whales from their primary feeding ground off R ...
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World's oldest tools found near Africa's Lake Turkana
San Francisco (UPI) Apr 16, 2015 -
A group of archaeologists say they've uncovered the world's oldest tools. At 3.3 million years old, the newly unearthed tools predate the evolution of modern humans.
Researchers, who presented their findings Tuesday at the annual meeting of the Paleoanthropology Society in San Francisco, said the primitive stone tools were likely made by one of modern man's ancestors, a hominid from the ...
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Rainforest protection akin to speed limit control
Bonn, Germany (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
The destruction of the Brazilian rainforest has slowed significantly. With around 5000 square kilometers annually, the loss is now about 80% lower than in 2004. Led by the Center for Development Research (ZEF) at the University of Bonn, an international team of researchers has evaluated the effectiveness of forest law enforcement in the Brazilian Amazon.
In some federal states of the Brazi ...
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NASA, USGS Begin Work on Landsat 9 to Continue Land Imaging Legacy
Washington DC (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) have started work on Landsat 9, planned to launch in 2023, which will extend the Earth-observing program's record of land images to half a century.
The Landsat program has provided accurate measurements of Earth's land cover since 1972. With data from Landsat satellites, ecologists have tracked deforestation in South America, water managers have m ...
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GOCE helps tap into sustainable energy resources
Paris (ESA) Apr 17, 2015 -
Going far above and beyond its original mission objectives, results from the GOCE gravity satellite are now being used to produce maps for geothermal energy development.
Geothermal energy is heat from under Earth's surface. From hot springs to magma, this energy provides a clean, sustainable resource that can be used to generate electricity, heat buildings, grow plants in greenhouses and m ...
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Artificial photosynthesis poses win/win for the environment
Berkeley CA (SPX) Apr 17, 2015 -
A potentially game-changing breakthrough in artificial photosynthesis has been achieved with the development of a system that can capture carbon dioxide emissions before they are vented into the atmosphere and then, powered by solar energy, convert that carbon dioxide into valuable chemical products, including biodegradable plastics, pharmaceutical drugs and even liquid fuels.
Scientists w ...
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