This spring will mark the 25th anniversary of the U.S. Department of Energy's designation of the Savannah River Site as the nation's first National Environmental Research Park. A publication out this week celebrates the occasion with colorful photographs and important information on what has been accomplished in the past quarter of a century.
Acadia National Park has been awarded grants for a pioneering genetic diversity study of wildlife to be conducted by The Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor and the federal Cooperative Park Studies Unit at the University of Maine.
With 1997 designated as the International Year of the Reef by marine scientists and conservationists, coral conservationissues have taken center stage. Recognizing the importance of these reef systems as one of the world's greatest habitats, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) targets coral conservation in both hemispheres, coupled with the Aquarium for Wildlife Conservation's coral breeding lab in New York.
Press release of issue dated February 22 for New Scientist: 1) Web Bank Robbers Poised To Pounce; 2) A Cheeky Little Powder And It Travels Well; 3) Go On Then, Have The Broccoli If You Must; 4) Did Lax Officials Let Britons Drink A Deadly Pint?; 5) Jaws Bids For Olympic Glory; 6) Cracking The Code Of Custom Drugs; 7) Planes At Risk From Space Intruders; 8) Mighty Mouse Takes On Hepatitis; 9) Best Noses In Town ; #10: An Awfully Deep Adventure; 11) Australia's Giant Lab; 12) Welcome To Clusterworld
When the National Geographic Society hunt for living giant squid sends sperm whales with video cameras to the ocean depths this month off New Zealand's South Island, the camerawhales will be tracked by the Cornell University Bioacoustics Research program. Distinctive click sounds produced by diving sperm whales will reveal their whereabouts to an array of hydrophones hanging vertically in the water, using Cornell equipment that pinpoints sound sources.
A set of 15 awards in a new $10 million program led by the National Science Foundation -- Speech, Text, Image and Multimedia Advanced Technology Effort (STIMULATE) -- will fund university researchers investigating human communication and seeking to improve our interaction with computers.
Conservation advocates may be overstating the promise of biodiversity prospecting -- the search for new products among genes found in wild organisms that may be of potential commercial value -- as a mechanism for financing the conservation of biological diversity, according to a new article published in Resources, the quarterly publication of Resources for the Future.
Los Alamos scientists have developed a simple, environmentally friendly test that can spot flaws in concrete long before visible signs of failure become apparent. The test, which involves special chemical dyes, could replace a current one that uses uranyl nitrate with its special environmental headaches.
Silicaon is one of the most common elements on earth, yet its surface structure is probably the most complicated of all --- a three-layered geometric construction of atoms with tiny holes at the peaks. Researchers at Northwestern University and the NEC Corporation in Japan have made the clearest images to date of this complex surface.
Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) will unveil a new strategy for conserving tigers at the Zoological Society of London symposium, "Tigers 2000." The meeting, scheduled for February 20-21, will bring together many of the world's top tiger experts.
Men with dependent personalities are more likely to have a significantly higher grade-point average than men with non-dependent personalities. That's according to research on the topic by Robert F. Bornstein, professor of psychology at Gettysburg College, PA.
Just as virtamin C protects humans and many animals from environmental stress, researchers at Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research Inc. at Cornell have found that mutant plants lacking vitamin C had shriveled leaves, and when grown in an ozone-contained environment, they were not able to cope with the environmental stress, and were hypersensitive to sulfur dioxide and ultraviolet B radiation.
The Northern Hemisphere's coldest month in more than 18 years may in part be due to a persistent low pressure system over the northwestern Atlantic Ocean, according to Dr. John Christy, an associate professor of atmospheric science in the Earth System Science Laboratory at The University of Alabama in Huntsville.
By the late 1980s, Thompson had developed the geographic mosaic theory of coevolution, which argues that the long-term dynamics of coevolution occur over large geographic areas rather than within local populations. Much of his current research is directed toward evaluating this theory, his work on Greya moths and the plants they pollinate, for example.
When did time begin? Physicist Joel Primack argues that science can answer the question. It's a fantastic scenario, involving the Big Bang, inflation, and "eternal inflation." He'll explain it all at the AAAS meeting in Seattle.
The influenza virus reproduces itself by pushing out a portion of a cell's outer membrane and pinching it off --- creating a new viral paricle than can go on to infect another cell. Just how the virus succeeds in pushing out the membrane has been clsarified by researchers at Northwestern University
Are the oldest stars in the galaxy more ancient than the universe itself? That's the embarrassing conundrum facing astronomers today. At the AAAS meeting in Seattle, astronomer Michael Bolte will discuss solid evidence that stellar ages won't fall below 15 billion years.
Los Alamos researchers have devised a scheme and algorithms to correct errors in quamtum computers, proposed machines that would manipulate the quantum states of individual atoms to perform calculations.
A micro-chip designed at the University of New Mexico's Microelectronics Research Center is at the heart of an upgrade unit being installed on the hubble Space Telescope next week.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences has nominated two documentary films produced with support from the National Science Foundation for an Academy Award.
In the next century, a personal computer could know from the inflection in your voice -- or by a smile or frown -- what you want it to do. Basic research in multimedia technology funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) is moving us much closer to that reality.
China and Indonesia suffered the deadliest and most destructive earthquakes in 1996, while the U.S. remained relatively quiet according to scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey, Department of the Interior. The last deadly earthquake in the U.S. was the 1994 Northridge, Calif., quake that took 60 lives.
Symmetries are evident everywhere in nature, even at the smallest scales of subatomic particles. At the AAAS meeting in Seattle, physicist Michael Dine will describe the latest work toward a theory of supersymmetry, which could round out the Standard Model of particle physics.
One of the most comprehensive World Wide Web sites for amateur bird-watchers and professional ornithologists, BirdSource, opened for business Feb. 14 by accepting data from participants in Project FeederWatch at http://www.ornith.cornell.edu/CS/PFW/main.html. Co-managed by the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society and constructed by the Cornell Theory Center, the Web site was demonstrated at the Seattle annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Embargo Date: 02/14/97
A half-million-year record of some deep-water cousins of crabs called ostracodes provides some of the strongest evidence yet that global climate change can reduce the variety of life forms on Earth, according to a report released Thursday (Feb. 13, 1997).
ATHENS, Ga. -- Last August, a group of scientists stunned the scientific world with evidence that life may have once existed on Mars. Their analysis of a Martian meterorite concluded that microscopic life may have been the source of "apparent" fossils it held. In the six months since then, several studies have questioned their interpretations. In a speech today (SATURDAY, 2/15, EMBARGOED) at the annual meeting of the AAAS, a key researcher in the original project called dismissals of the claims entirely premature.
Tensegrity structures that bounce back to shape after being deformed require complicated mathematics, a Cornell expert told an audience at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Embargo Date: 02/14.97
Life on Mars probably did and may still exist, a Cornell astronomer says. Mars, like Earth, has a "deep, hot biosphere" teeming with microbial life well beneath the surface, Tom Gold told the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Embargo Date: 02/13/97
The onion bulb mite -- Rhizoglyphus robini -- has begun to attack some of New York's prized onion fields. Cornell University scientists are studying management techniques to control it.
Hundreds of students in schools across the United States are helping biologists research questions about birds, a Cornell University ornithologist told an American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) session on classroom science Feb. 16. When scientists and school children collaborate, everyone gains, said Andre Dhondt. Embargo Date: 02/16/97
Some of the same evolutionary "predispositions" that held together extended families for our hunter-gatherer ancestors -- and even prototypical nuclear families until recently -- are partly to blame for today's dysfunction, conflict and violence within fractured families, Cornell University biologist Stephen Emlen reported Feb. 14 at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Embargo Date: 02/14/97
Thirty years after the first Green Revolution, Cornell researchers want to kick-start another one. This time, they want to add micronutrients to staple crops, making the food we eat even more nutritious. Embargo Date: 02/18/97
From upstate New York and Massachusetts Bay to Puget Sound and the Pacific shoreline, thousands of grade-school students are collecting data on Monarch butterfly migrations, songbird populations, astronomy, and environmental science. Professional researchers will use this data to advance scientific knowledge.
"There is mounting evidence that Mars is a water-rich planet that may have experienced warmer climates, and therefore, life, in the past,"according to Michael Carr, an astrogeologist with the U.S.Geological Survey in Menlo Park, Calif., at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, in Seattle, on Thursday, Feb. 13.
Water quality and quantity on Earth and the possibility of water on Mars are the topics of presentations by scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey at this week's annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) at the Seattle Convention Center.
Astrophysicist Douglas Lin of UC Santa Cruz will discuss the dramatic evolution of models of planetary formation in an invited talk at the AAAS meeting in Seattle. New models must account for the wide variety of planets found since November 1995.
Only 10 percent of children with attention deficiet hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) receive any kind of therapy to help them modify their behavior. A Purdue University expert on ADHD says that figure should be near 100 percent.
Using $1.29 acrylic boxes from a dime store and simple electronics, undergraduate students and their lab instructor at The University of Alabama in Huntsville are doing cutting edge research into sonoluminesence, a little understood phenomenon sometimes referred to as "a star in a jar."
Two viruses, the feline leukemia virus -- FELV -- and the feline immunodeficiency virus -- FIV -- are infecting the cat population in a manner similar to the AIDS-related human immunodeficiency virus -- HIV.
A special symposium, "Integrating Watershed Ecosystem Studies for Improved Natural Resource Management" will be presented in Seattle, WA, on February 15 as part of the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). The symposium will highlight the use of long-term, ecosystem-level studies for detecting changes in biological, chemical, and physical processes associated with watersheds.
Scientists believe there is little doubt that compounds called polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) cause cancer in animal studies. It has been illegal to produce PCBs in the United States since 1977, but huge amounts of the compounds remain in the environment, raising serious concerns for public health officials. A new study, however, has found that many of the PCBs in the environment in this country may not be as carcinogenic as previously thought.
Biochemists at the University of Georgia have discovered an unusual phosphorus-containing compound in an extreme-heat-loving bacterium -- a discovery that will advance thinking about how life exists near the boiling point in underwater volcanic vents.
Technology transfer may have found its way from "Star Trek's" starship Enterprise to Earth. Many Star Trek fans are familiar with clear "data cubes" frequently seen on the television program and used by the crew to access information. A researcher at The University of Alabama in Huntsville believes the Enterprise's technology isn't so futuristic. Using holographic technology, a similar data storage device could hold a tremendous amount of data and provide rapid access.
HOUSTON, February 11, 1997 -- Of the three teams in the world that can coax the elusive Bose-Einstein condensation into existence, only the Rice University team can make it using atoms that attract each other. This provides a unique situation for studying the interactions of the atoms in this rare state of matter. For this reason, the Rice team is taking an especially close look at the mechanics of how their condensate forms and the special properties it possesses. Their findings contribute to a basic understanding of interactions on the atomic level.
Two Johns Hopkins University comet experts are heading research projects on Comet Hale-Bopp and are available for comment to reporters. The astronomers have also completed a yearlong study of the comet with the Hubble Space Telescope, learning new details about the comet. This release also contains a fact sheet about Hale-Bopp and comets in general.
Picture an ideal university: it has a pervasive culture promoting collaborative research between professors and students; there are internet links between research labs, libraries and students; and there is an emphasis on discovery-based learning techniques throughout science and engineering curricula.
Researchers at Resources for the Future have found a deposit/refund system to be the most cost-effective policy among those that rely on economic incentives to reduce municipal solid waste. They suggest that a modest reduction in recyclable wastes -- including glass, paper and plastic -- could be achieved if the federal government used a deposit/refund policy that charged the deposit fee to manufacturers of consumer products, with the subsequent refund then granted to collectors of recyclable materials.
Southern California may soon be the best-surveyed area on the planet, thanks to powerful tools used by scientists seeking to understand the region's earthquake potential.
As Congress begins to consider the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) proposals to tighten standards for two major air pollutants, Resources for the Future today releases a briefing paper on the key issues in the clean air debate. It describes EPA's proposed new rules for ground-level ozone and particulate matter, both of which have been linked to adverse effects on human health, and discusses the major policy questions that the proposals raise.
The National Science Foundation (NSF) is accepting requests from professional journalists to visit Antarctica during the 1997-1998 field season to report on research by the U.S. Antarctic Program (USAP).
RSS
Medicine keyboard_arrow_right
Sciencekeyboard_arrow_right
Life keyboard_arrow_right
Business keyboard_arrow_right
Journal News keyboard_arrow_right
By Location keyboard_arrow_right
Meetings, Grants, and Events keyboard_arrow_right