Geography Blog From Networlddirectory

A recent discovery in understanding how to chemically break down the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide into a useful form opens the doors for researchers to wonder what organism is out there - or could be created - to accomplish the task. University of Michigan biological chemist Steve Ragsdale, along with...

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The increased frequency and intensity of oxygen-deprived "dead zones" along the world's coasts can negatively impact environmental conditions in far more than just local waters. In the March 12 edition of the journal Science, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science oceanographer Dr. Lou Codispoti explains that the increased amount...

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"Green" labels do not pack the same wallop for California wines that they do for low-energy appliances, organically grown produce and other environmentally friendly products, but it's not because there's anything wrong with the wine, a new UCLA-led study has observed. In fact, wines made with organically grown grapes actually...

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A collaboration led by scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy's Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) has developed a microbe that can produce an advanced biofuel directly from biomass. Deploying the tools of synthetic biology, the JBEI scientists engineered a strain of Escherichia coli (E. coli) bacteria to produce biodiesel fuel...

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New York subway commuters may worry more about rats and rising fares than dust floating through the system, but for the workers who spend their whole shift below ground, air quality has long been a concern. Results from a new pilot study using miniaturized air samplers to look at steel...

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A study by University of Michigan scientists offers new insight into what happens to mercury deposited onto Arctic snow from the atmosphere. The work also provides a new approach to tracking mercury's movement through Arctic ecosystems. Mercury is a naturally occurring element, but some 2000 tons of it enter the...

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The fact that glaciers in the Himalayan mountains are thinning is not disputed. However, few scientists have attempted to rigorously examine and quantify the causes. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory scientist Surabi Menon set out to isolate the impacts of the most usually blamed culprit-greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide-from other...

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A team from the Department of Plant Biology and Ecology at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) are focusing their research on the study of the ecology of rivers. The person in charge is Mr Jesús Pozo. For more than twenty years this team has been trying to identify...

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Whether it's never-ending heat waves or winter storms, atmospheric blocking can have a significant impact on local agriculture, business and the environment. Eventhough these stagnant weather patterns are often difficult to predict, University of Missouri scientists are now studying whether increasing planet temperatures and carbon dioxide levels could lead to...

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Researchers are reporting that "biochar" a material that the Amazonian Indians used to enhance soil fertility centuries ago has potential in the modern world to help slow global climate change. Mass production of biochar could capture and sock away carbon that otherwise would wind up in the atmosphere...

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Dispelling the notion that urban "green" spaces help counteract greenhouse gas emissions, new research has found - in Southern California at least - that total emissions might be lower if lawns did not exist. Turfgrass lawns help remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through photosynthesis and store it as organic...

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Pyrethroids, among the most widely-used home pesticides, are winding up in California rivers at levels toxic to some stream-dwellers, possibly endangering the food supply of fish and other aquatic animals, as per a newly released study by scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, and Southern Illinois University (SIU)...........

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A newly released study by scientists at UCLA and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston suggests that improvements in air quality over the past decade have resulted in fewer cases of ear infections in children. Ear infections are one of the most common illnesses among children, with annual direct and...

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Researchers in Texas are reporting that a technique used in the search for new drugs could also be used in the quest to discover new, environmentally friendly materials for fighting global warming. Such materials could be used to capture the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide from industrial smokestacks and other fixed...

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Civil engineers at the University of Washington and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Seattle office have taken a first look at how dams in the Columbia River basin, the nation's largest hydropower system, could be managed for a different climate. They developed a new technique to determine when to...

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When it comes to saving the environment, Generation Y is all for it - as long as it comes with an economic benefit, as per new research by Michigan State University in collaboration with Deloitte LLP. Based on a scientific survey of 18- to 30-year-olds, scientists from MSU's Eli Broad...

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A new analysis of global surface temperatures by NASA researchers finds the past year was tied for the second warmest since 1880. In the Southern Hemisphere, 2009 was the warmest year on record. Eventhough 2008 was the coolest year of the decade because of a strong La Nina that cooled...

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The recent trend towards earlier UK springs and summers has been accelerating, as per a research studypublished recently (9 February 2010) in the scientific journal Global Change Biology The collaborative study, involving researchers from 12 UK research institutions, universities and conservation organisations, is the most comprehensive and rigorous evaluation so...

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Researchers have published the first report on a new way of preventing potentially harmful plasticizers the source of long-standing human health concerns from migrating from one of the most widely used groups of plastics. The advance could lead to a new generation of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastics that...

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The combination of low concentrations of oxygen and nutrients in the lower layers of the beaches of Alaska's Prince William Sound is slowing the aerobic biodegradation of oil remaining from the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill, as per scientists at Temple University. Considered one of the worst environmental disasters in history,...

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