Earth

An additive may help curb a chemical reaction that causes wine to look, smell and taste funky, according to food scientists.

The researchers added chelation compounds that bind with metals to inhibit oxidation, or oxygen's ability to react with some of the trace metals that are found in the wine, according to Gal Kreitman, a doctoral candidate in food science, Penn State.

Bisphosphonates are a group of compounds that have become well-known and are extensively used as drugs for treating bone-related diseases, such as osteoporosis. New uses for bisphosphonates were discovered, as their ability to form physical gels in pure water was reported for the first time in a recent study performed in collaboration with the Universities of Jyväskylä and Eastern Finland.

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) — Among the most impressive ecological findings of the past 25 years is the ability of invasive plants to radically change ecosystem function. Yet few if any studies have examined whether ecosystem impacts of invasions persist over time, and what that means for plant communities and ecosystem restoration.

INDIANAPOLIS -- How can the actions and reactions of proteins so small or stars so distant they are invisible to the human eye be accurately predicted? How can blurry images be brought into focus and reconstructed?

This news release is available in German.

Maximizing returns on financial investments depends on accurately understanding and effectively accounting for weather and climate risks, according to a new study by the American Meteorological Society (AMS) Policy Program.

WASHINGTON D.C. Nov. 19, 2013 -- A team of biochemists and mathematicians have developed a sophisticated geometric model to predict how a biological molecule will interact with water molecules, computing the results up to 20 times faster than other existing approaches. This new approach may help researchers find new drugs to treat human diseases, said the team, who described their theoretical approach in the Journal of Chemical Physics, which is produced by AIP Publishing.

ANN ARBOR—The odds of preterm birth for women exposed to a commonly used class of chemicals known as phthalates are increased significantly, according to a new study from the University of Michigan School of Public Health and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

Depending on the individual phthalate, women with the highest levels of exposure during pregnancy had two-to-five times the odds of preterm birth, compared to women with the lowest exposure.

A group of nanoparticles called "GUMBOS" is as varied as their culinary namesake implies, with a wide range of potential applications from cancer therapy to sensors. GUMBOS are the focus of a new video from the American Chemical Society's (ACS) Prized Science series. The videos are available at http://www.acs.org/PrizedScience.

LAS CRUCES, NM--A new study contains valuable information for homeowners and horticulturalists that live and work in desert regions. The study, the first of its type to classify desert plants into nine common types, includes recommendations for helping to plan and integrate lower water-use plants into urban landscapes. Interestingly, the researchers also determined that front- and backyard environments can differ significantly.

A team of researchers from the RIKEN Nishina Center for Accelerator-Based Science in Japan has demonstrated that the magic numbers 20 and 28 disappear from all neutron-rich magnesium isotopes, thereby establishing a new, larger area of nuclear deformation in the nuclear chart.

The Japanese study, published today in the prestigious journal Physical Review Letters, was made possible by the intense beam at the Radioactive Beam Factory (RIBF) at RIKEN, which produces the most intense radioactive isotope beams in the world.

COLLEGE STATION, TX--The Agricultural Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences of Texas A&M University recently announced the release of 'CaroTex-312', a new high-yielding, orange-fruited, Habanero type, F1 hybrid pepper (Capsicum chinense Jacq.).

Advances in technology for computation and information storage always require to make the systems smaller and faster. The limits of miniaturization are those set by nature: Materials are composed by specific units, the atoms, that cannot be further divided. The question arising is: Can we still codify information at the atomic scale? And the answer is yes, we can! but one needs to manipulate a property of the atoms, individually, and keep them in that state there for sufficiently long time to be able to read it.

Global emissions of carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels are set to rise again in 2013, reaching a record high of 36 billion tonnes - according to new figures from the Global Carbon Project, co-led by researchers from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia (UEA).

The 2.1 per cent rise projected for 2013 means global emissions from burning fossil fuel are 61 per cent above 1990 levels, the baseline year for the Kyoto Protocol.

AUSTIN, Texas — Researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have developed a simple scaling theory to estimate gas production from hydraulically fractured wells in the Barnett Shale. The method is intended to help the energy industry accurately identify low- and high-producing horizontal wells, as well as accurately predict how long it will take for gas reserves to deplete in the wells.