Earth

PITTSBURGH -- Conventional motion capture for film and game production involves multiple cameras and actors festooned with markers. A new technique developed by Disney Research, Pittsburgh, has demonstrated how three-dimensional motion capture can be accomplished with a single camera and without aid of markers.

An international study to understand and predict the likely impact of ocean acidification on shellfish and other marine organisms living in seas from the tropics to the poles is published this week (date) in the journal Global Change Biology.

Ocean acidification is occurring because some of the increased carbon dioxide humans are adding to the atmosphere dissolves in the ocean and reacts with water to produce an acid.

When a damaging earthquake struck the area of L'Aquila in central Italy in 2009, it was the latest in the region's long history of strong and persistent quakes. The rich recorded history of settlement in the area, along with oral traditions, archaeological excavations, inscriptions and medieval texts, and offer insight into how often the region might expect destructive earthquakes.

AMES, Iowa – By blending optical and atomic force microscope technologies, Iowa State University and Ames Laboratory researchers have found a way to complete 3-D measurements of single biological molecules with unprecedented accuracy and precision.

Existing technologies allow researchers to measure single molecules on the x and y axes of a 2-D plane. The new technology allows researchers to make height measurements (the z axis) down to the nanometer – just a billionth of a meter – without custom optics or special surfaces for the samples.

Single particles of light, also known as photons, have been produced and implemented into a quantum key distribution (QKD) link, paving the way for unbreakable communication networks.

The results of the experiment, undertaken by a close collaboration of researchers based in Wuerzburg, Munich and Stuttgart, have been published today, Thursday 2 August, in the Institute of Physics and German Physical Society's New Journal of Physics.

Tomato breeders scored a coup several years ago when they identified tomatoes with a genetic defect that made the fruits mature very slowly, even under the influence of the phytohormone ethylene. Traders and growers were delighted as it gave them more time to transport the crop, initially still green, from where it was harvested to where it would be sold. At the stores, the tomatoes could then be treated with ethylene to bring them to maturity.

Soil is the most species-rich microbial ecosystem in the world. From this incredible diversity, plants specifically choose certain species, give them access to the root and so host a unique, carefully selected bacterial community from which they then benefit in a variety of ways. To achieve this, the plant's immune system must be able to tell which of these bacteria are friends and which foes.

The rise of the Rocky Mountains and the appearance of a major seaway that divided North America may have boosted the evolution of new dinosaur species, according to a new Ohio University-led study.

The finding, published today in the journal PLOS ONE, may explain patterns of evolution and migration of North American duck-billed and horned dinosaurs in the years leading up to their extinction 65 million years ago, said Terry Gates, a postdoctoral researcher with Ohio University's Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine who is lead author on the study.

Although these issues are too complex to yield a direct causal link between climate change and security concerns, he said, understanding the levels of vulnerability that exist is crucial in comprehending the full effect of this changing paradigm.

The vulnerability mapping program within CCAPS is led by Joshua Busby, assistant professor at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs.

Changes in seismic velocity--changes in the speeds at which seismic waves move through the Earth's crust--have been identified during and after many earthquakes. But do these changes also happen before an earthquake, and could they be measured as a way to predict a quake on the way? The search for a clear and measurable pre-quake signal has been called "the holy grail of seismology."

The press release and paper noted below, publishing in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, is strictly under embargo until 12:00 Noon Eastern Time US on August 2, 2012.

Now's the time to prepare for the heat waves, heavy rains and droughts that climate change will bring, says Stanford's Chris Field, a noted climate researcher.

Speaking Wednesday at a contentious U.S. Senate hearing on climate change, Stanford's Chris Field, an expert on climate change, offered a stark yet hopeful analogy.

Perhaps no other material is generating as much excitement in the electronics world as graphene, sheets of pure carbon just one atom thick through which electrons can race at nearly the speed of light – 100 times faster than they move through silicon. Superthin, superstrong, superflexible and superfast as an electrical conductor, graphene has been touted as a potential wonder material for a host of applications, starting with ultrafast transistors. For the vast potential of graphene to be fully realized, however, scientists must first learn more about what makes graphene so super.

Boulder, Colo., USA – Two Geology studies focus on debris flows and landslides, one from the point of view of alpine denudation and the other studying and quantifying hazards to human populations. Subjects of other studies include fossil microatolls and sea level; the potential rupture area for an earthquake offshore of the U.S. Pacific Northwest and British Columbia; paleoclimate; and the relationship between the formation of ore deposits and the growth cycle of microbial communities.