Earth

Cambridge, Mass. – October 14, 2012 – In Harvard's Pierce Hall, the surface of a small germanium-coated gold sheet shines vividly in crimson. A centimeter to the right, where the same metallic coating is literally only about 20 atoms thicker, the surface is a dark blue, almost black. The colors form the logo of the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), where researchers have demonstrated a new way to customize the color of metal surfaces by exploiting a completely overlooked optical phenomenon.

MIAMI -- A new study by scientists at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science shows that corals may be more severely impacted by climate warming when they contain too many symbiotic algae. The single-celled algae living inside corals are usually the key to coral success, providing the energy needed to build massive reef frameworks. However, when temperatures become too warm, these algae are expelled from corals during episodes of coral 'bleaching' that can lead to widespread death of corals.

Scientists from the University of Southampton have identified a repeating trigger for the largest explosive volcanic eruptions on Earth.

The Las Cañadas volcanic caldera on Tenerife, in the Canary Islands, has generated at least eight major eruptions during the last 700,000 years. These catastrophic events have resulted in eruption columns of over 25km high and expelled widespread pyroclastic material over 130km. By comparison, even the smallest of these eruptions expelled over 25 times more material than the 2010 eruption of Eyjafjallajökull, Iceland.

PROVIDENCE, RI [Brown University]--Researchers at Brown University have been awarded $1.75 million to explore the potential of using carbon dioxide instead of fossil fuels in the production of common industrial chemicals. Advances in this area could help reduce the chemical industry's carbon footprint and help stabilize production costs in the face of ever increasing fuel prices.

Funding for the project comes from the National Science Foundation's Centers for Chemical Innovation (CCI) Program, which supports research focused on long-term, fundamental chemical research challenges.

Scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego have used 20 years of satellite data to reveal a geological oddity unlike any seen on Earth.

At very low temperatures, close to absolute zero, chemical reactions may proceed at a much higher rate than classical chemistry says they should – because in this extreme chill, quantum effects enter the picture. A Weizmann Institute team has now confirmed this experimentally; their results would not only provide insight into processes in the intriguing quantum world in which particles act as waves, it might explain how chemical reactions occur in the vast frigid regions of interstellar space.

A new study by the Simon Fraser University-based Human Security Report Project (HSRP), released today at the United Nations headquarters in New York, finds that there is no compelling evidence to support a host of widely held beliefs regarding wartime sexual violence.

The study, presented by HSRP director Andrew Mack, disputes the common assumption that conflict-related sexual violence is on the rise, and argues that the experience of a small number of countries afflicted by extreme levels of sexual violence is not the norm for all war-affected countries.Key findings include:

Catalysts are substances that speed up the rates of chemical reactions without themselves being chemically changed. Industrial catalysts come in two main types - heterogeneous, in which the catalyst is in a different phase from the reactants; and homogeneous, in which catalyst and the reactants are in the same phase. Heterogeneous catalysts are valued for their sustainability because they can be recycled. Homogeneous catalysts are valued for their product selectivity as their properties can be easily tuned through relatively simple chemistry.

A study in the current issue of Scientific Reports, a new online journal from the Nature Publishing Group, shows that small forage fish like anchovies can play an important role in the "biological pump," the process by which marine life transports carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and surface ocean into the deep sea—where it contributes nothing to current global warming.

More efficient use of the food production chain and a decrease in the amount of food losses will dramatically help maintaining the planet's natural resources and improve people's lives. Researchers in Aalto University, Finland, have proved a valid estimation, for the first time, for how many people could be fed with reducing food losses. The world's population is an estimated seven billion people. An additional one billion can be fed from our current resources, if the food losses could be halved.

Polarstern is expected back from the Central Arctic expedition "IceArc" in Bremerhaven on 8 October 2012 after a good two months. 54 scientists and technicians from twelve different countries conducted research on the retreat of the sea ice and the consequences for the Arctic Ocean and its ecosystems over a period of two months in the High North. A number of new technologies were used for to film and photograph life in and below the ice down to a depth of 4400 metres.

More efficient use of the food production chain and a decrease in the amount of food losses will dramatically help maintaining the planet's natural resources and improve people's lives. Researchers in Aalto University, Finland, have proved a valid estimation, for the first time, for how many people could be fed with reducing food losses. The world's population is an estimated seven billion people. An additional one billion can be fed from our current resources, if the food losses could be halved.

University of Adelaide applied mathematicians have extended Einstein's theory of special relativity to work beyond the speed of light.

Einstein's theory holds that nothing could move faster than the speed of light, but Professor Jim Hill and Dr Barry Cox in the University's School of Mathematical Sciences have developed new formulas that allow for travel beyond this limit.

Researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine have shown for the first time in an animal model that vitamin C actively protects against osteoporosis, a disease affecting large numbers of elderly women and men in which bones become brittle and can fracture. The findings are published in the October 8 online edition of PLoS ONE.

Medicines could be made to have fewer side effects and work in smaller doses with the help of a new technique that makes drug molecules more resistant to breakdown by the human liver.

Researchers based at Princeton University reported in the journal Science that they created a synthetic enzyme that acts as a catalyst to replace certain hydrogen atoms of a drug molecule with fluorine atoms. This swap stabilizes the molecule and makes it resistant to the liver enzymes that can inactivate a drug or create toxic byproducts.