Imagine camping in the deep woods. You’d want a tent with mesh that prevents bugs – even those as small as gnats – from entering into your wildlife hangout. That’s the idea behind “Citrus Under Protective Screens,” or CUPS, which helps keep away a pin-head-sized insect that causes citrus greening, University of Florida scientists say.
Epigenetics may explain how Darwin’s finches respond to rapid environmental changes.
Texas potato growers may be few in number, but their spuds hit a market window that brings a premium each year at harvest. Now, a new potato scientist for Texas A&M AgriLife Research plans to pack even more value into the commodity through traditional and molecular breeding.
New mapping methods developed by researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory can help urban planners minimize the environmental impacts of cities’ water and energy demands on surrounding stream ecologies.
In recent decades, change has defined our environment in the United States. But, says a new University of Wisconsin-Madison study, while those changes usually result in poor water quality, lakes have surprisingly stayed the same.
With funding from energy utilities, researchers from The University of Alabama are leading a study to understand the frequency and possible size of ancient floods along the Tennessee River.
Charles R. Bentley, an intrepid University of Wisconsin-Madison glaciologist and geophysicist who was among the first scientists to measure the West Antarctic Ice Sheet in the late 1950s, died Aug. 19 in Oakland, California. He was 87.
Researchers at the University of California, Riverside have begun to unravel the molecular mechanisms behind how ants use their sense of smell to distinguish between colony members so they can work together in a complex, hierarchical society.
As the global climate changes and temperatures continue to rise, heat stress is becoming a major limiting factor for pea cultivation. A new study indicates that pea plants with some specific traits – such as longer flowering time and higher pod numbers – may be more resistant to heat stress. The researchers also gained new insights into the genetics of heat tolerance in pea.
A new study published today (August 23) in the Journal of Air and Waste Management Association builds upon recent heavy-duty natural gas vehicle methane emission measurements to model methane emissions from a future, much larger vehicle fleet. This study, conducted by researchers at West Virginia University’s Center for Alternative Fuels, Engines, and Emissions, comes as the price of natural gas has decreased, leading to interest in natural gas as a cleaner replacement for diesel in heavy-duty vehicles.
Using plants and trees to make products such as paper or ethanol leaves behind a residue called lignin, a component of plant cell walls. That leftover lignin isn’t good for much and often gets burned or tossed into landfills. Now, researchers report transforming lignin into carbon fiber to produce a lower-cost material strong enough to build car or aircraft parts.
A team of engineers has developed stretchable fuel cells that extract energy from sweat and are capable of powering electronics, such as LEDs and Bluetooth radios. The biofuel cells generate 10 times more power per surface area than any existing wearable biofuel cells. The devices could be used to power a range of wearable devices.
UGA researchers pinpoint a mutation that triggered the development of the modern tomato from its tiny berry-sized ancestor
The ecological footprint of a city spreads far beyond its city limits, resulting in local and total extinction of hundreds of aquatic species in North America. Recent research quantifies the adverse effects while looking ahead to how cities can help.
In the megacities that are home to nearly 10 percent of the world’s 7.5 billion people, trees provide each city with more than $500 million each year in services that make urban environments cleaner, more affordable and more pleasant places to live.
More targeted efforts are needed from both the public and private insurance sectors in order to encourage people to take action to reduce their risk of flood damage, according to a new study of three European countries.
GCOOS has received $450,000 for two new High Frequency Radar (HFR) sites near the mouth of the Mississippi River.
Baleen whales are amongst the largest animals to have ever lived and yet very little is known about their breeding habits. One researcher’s second look at previously found baleen whale fossils from Japan provides new evidence of a now long-gone breeding ground of the extinct baleen whale Parietobalaena yamaokai dating back over 15 million years.
A new University of Utah-led study shows that targeted forest regeneration among the largest and closest forest fragments in the Eastern Arc Mountains of Tanzania and the Atlantic Forest of Brazil can dramatically reduce extinction rates of bird species over time.
The study analyzed multiple species of Inga, a genus of tropical trees that produces defensive chemicals, and their various insect herbivores. The researchers found that closely-related plants evolved very different defensive traits. Additionally, their analysis revealed that herbivores may drive evolution of plant defenses, but may not show coevolutionary adaptations. Instead, they may ‘chase’ plants based on the herbivore’s own traits at the time they encounter a new host.
Can a group of three single-celled, algae-like organisms produce high quantities of sugar just right for making biofuels? Laboratory results indicate that they can. Sandia National Laboratories is helping Bay Area-based HelioBioSys understand whether these cyanobacteria can be grown large scale.
Scientists always assumed it was a northern flying squirrel gliding through the canopies of Pacific coastal forests.
Behavior experiments are useful tools to study brain function. Standard experiments to investigate behavior in popular lab animals such as fish, flies or mice however only incompletely mimic natural conditions. The understanding of behavior and brain function is thus limited. Virtual Reality (VR) helps in generating a more natural experimental environment but requires immobilization of the animal, disrupting sensorimotor experience and causing altered neuronal and behavioral responses. Researchers at the University of Freiburg, and the Max F. Perutz Laboratories (MFPL), a joint venture of the University of Vienna and the Medical University of Vienna, in collaboration with groups at the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) and the MPI for Ornithology in Konstanz, have now developed a VR system for freely moving animals – FreemoVR – to overcome most of these limitations. Their findings are now published in Nature Methods.
Portland, ME—Biodiversity Research Institute (BRI) has confirmed today that the translocation of loon chicks from Maine to Massachusetts has resulted in at least one loon returning to its release lake. In its fifth year of a five-year initiative funded by the Ricketts Conservation Foundation, Restore the Call is the largest Common Loon conservation study ever conducted. Research efforts have focused in three key U.S. breeding population areas from the western mountains to the Atlantic seaboard.
Coral reefs can’t seem to catch a break. Not only are rising temperatures wreaking havoc with their environment, but emerging evidence suggests that a certain sunblock component in many lotions that may help protect humans from developing skin cancer is a coral killer. Now, researchers have developed a biodegradable bead that can soak up the sunblock ingredient, oxybenzone, like a thirsty sea sponge. They hope to use the agent to clean up seawater at beaches.
Nectar, the high-energy ‘honey’ produced by flowers, might be a brilliant distraction technique to help protect a flower’s reproductive parts, according to new research. Rather than merely providing a ‘come-on’ to bees and other insects to attract them to pollinate the flower, nectar could be playing a much more subtle and entrancing role.
In the 13th episode of Northwestern Pritzker School of Law’s Planet Lex podcast series, host Dean Daniel Rodriguez discusses these hot-button topics with Kirkland & Ellis Professor of Law David Dana and Associate Professor of Law Nadav Shoked.
Chemical engineers at the University of Notre Dame have discovered a catalytic process that could help curb emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOx) from diesel-powered vehicles, a priority air pollutant that is a key ingredient in smog.
Saint Louis University scientist Kasey Fowler-Finn, Ph.D., and her research team will study treehoppers to learn how changing temperatures affect singing insects' ability to recognize the songs of potential mates.
A new study from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis validates that the central core of the East Antarctic ice sheet should remain stable even if the West Antarctic ice sheet melts.
In April, a bobcat was hit by a car in Lansing, N.Y. and received treatment at the Janet L. Swanson Wildlife Health Center to repair a severe front leg fracture and dislocated hip. After spending ten weeks recovering with a local licensed wildlife rehabilitator, he was returned to a Cornell Botanic Garden’s managed natural area, which was close to his original home range, but further away from busy roads. Throughout his treatment and rehabilitation, he remained fierce and wild, never looking back as he bolted from a large carrier out into the beautiful meadow and the dense forest beyond.
Iowa State University scientists are contributing to a multi-institutional effort to help corn stand up to stress brought on by drought and disease by using viruses and aphids to activate desirable traits. It’s speculative research that could yield new insight into how viruses, insects and plants interact.
For the first time, scientists have shown that a female fruit fly’s pheromone signals can actually tell males how much energy her body has invested in egg production versus in storing away energy for her own survival. And it’s a signal that she can’t change in order to make herself more attractive.
After nearly two years of planning, a team of scientists from the U.S. and Cuba has explored never-before-studied mesophotic coral reefs along the entire coast of Cuba, spanning about 1,500 miles. Except for a few places along the coast, prior to this expedition, there were virtually no data or charts indicating what was beyond the shallow reef zone.
In a new study, researchers at The Ohio State University estimate algal blooms at two Ohio lakes cost Ohio homeowners $152 million in lost property value over six years. Meanwhile, a related study suggests that algae is driving anglers away from Lake Erie, causing fishing license sales to drop at least 10 percent every time a bloom reaches a moderate level of health risk.
A study of flood damage in Florida by scientists at UC Santa Cruz and the Nature Conservancy proposes prioritizing property buyouts based on flood risk, ecological value, and socioeconomic conditions.
As corals face threats from warming oceans, a new study uses modern genetic-sequencing tools to help reveal the relationships between three similar-looking corals.
A group of Western Illinois University biologists and biology graduate and undergraduate students are working with the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) Upper Midwest Environmental Sciences Center (UMESC) to conduct ecological studies on Asian carp in the Upper Illinois and Mississippi rivers.
To help protect coral reefs, NSU researchers helped identify new anchorage area for Port Miami
It’s not every day United States history mixes with microbes in the soil. But when the turf on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. was replaced, it offered scientists the opportunity to study changes in the soil microbiome underneath.
EL PASO, Texas - West Nile virus is no stranger to the U.S.-Mexico border; thousands of people in the region have contracted the mosquito-borne virus in the past. But could this previous exposure affect how intensely Zika sickens someone now?
Canadian scientists have discovered that certain lake predators are altering their behaviour due to climate change, revealing what the future may hold for these fish and their food.
Amphibians can evolve increased tolerance to pesticides, but the adaptation can make them more susceptible to parasites, according to a team that includes researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Researchers from the University of Delaware have joined a team from Western Sydney University in Australia to examine the addition of silicon to the soil in which plants are grown to help strengthen plants against potential predators.
Tulane University researchers have received a grant from the Morris Animal Foundation to continue study on lead exposure in wildlife.
Mainstream criticism of people who deny climate change essentially portrays climate skeptics as being out of touch, ignorant or somehow incapable of understanding the facts about climate change.
Biologists conducted the first large-scale experiment on a Superfund site using poplar trees fortified with a probiotic — or natural microbe — to clean up groundwater contaminated with trichloroethylene, or TCE.
Last week, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories flew a tethered balloon and an unmanned aerial system, colloquially known as a drone, together for the first time to get Arctic atmospheric temperatures with better location control than ever before.
University of Michigan biologist Melissa Duhaime recently spent a month on a Russian research vessel off the coast of Antarctica, filtering bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms from thousands of gallons of seawater.
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