Earth

When water is scarce, Ecuador laurel trees (Cordia alliodora) ramp up their investment in a syrupy treat known as honeydew imbibed by ants (Azteca pittieri) that nest in the laurels' stem cavities. Honeydew is not produced directly by the trees, but by tiny, sap-sucking bugs called scale insects. The higher availability of honeydew when conditions are dry sends resident ant defenders into overdrive, boosting their numbers, and the ants protect the trees more vigorously from defoliation by leaf-munching pests.

Aerosol particles in the Earth's atmosphere scatter and absorb light differently at different wavelengths, thereby affecting the amount of incoming sunlight that reaches the planet's surface and the amount of heat that escapes, potentially altering the planet's climate.

Most recent regional studies of aerosol trends have used satellite data to examine aerosol levels over ocean regions; fewer regional studies have measured aerosol over land.

WASHINGTON D.C. Nov. 5, 2013 -- We use aluminum to make planes lightweight, store sodas in recyclable containers, keep the walls of our homes energy efficient and ensure that the Thanksgiving turkey is cooked to perfection. Now, thanks to a group of Japanese researchers, there may soon be a new application for the versatile metal: hydrogen storage for fuel cells.

Fibre optic cables are turned in to a quantum lab: scientists are trying to build optical switches at the smallest possible scale in order to manipulate light. At the Vienna University of Technology, this can now be done using a single atom. Conventional glass fibre cables, which are used for internet data transfer, can be interconnected by tiny quantum systems.

Light in a Bottle

A new study has discovered a striking connection between the number of pictures of Hurricane Sandy posted on Flickr and the atmospheric pressure in New Jersey as the hurricane crashed through the US state in 2012.

Hurricane Sandy was the second-costliest hurricane to hit the US, hitting 24 states in late October last year, with New Jersey one of the worst affected.

SCIENCE CHINA Chemistry published a special topic on extraction of uranium from Seawater recently.

Owing to the fast economic growing and the concern over greenhouse gases and air pollution, the development of nuclear energy is one important option to meet the expanded energy consumption in our future.

To achieve that goal, continuing and reliable supplies of uranium are critical to future nuclear power projects. As is well known, global terrestrial reserves of uranium are limited and the deposits in China are relatively small.

BOSTON -- There is more to the cost of living in a food desert than higher prices for the few fruits and vegetables sold nearby, according to a study by an Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis researcher and the Marion County Public Health Department.

President Obama marked the anniversary of Superstorm Sandy with an executive order last Friday "preparing the United States for the impacts of climate change."

A new study correlates a series of small earthquakes near Snyder, Texas between 2006 and 2011 with the underground injection of large volumes of gas, primarily carbon dioxide (CO2) — a finding that is relevant to the process of capturing and storing CO2 underground.

From supersensitive detections of magnetic fields to quantum information processing, the key to a number of highly promising advanced technologies may lie in one of the most common defects in diamonds. Researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California (UC) Berkeley have taken an important step towards unlocking this key with the first ever detailed look at critical ultrafast processes in these diamond defects.

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KUALA LUMPUR - The Prime Minister of Malaysia today outlined his country's position on the United Nations' next set of global development goals, saying they need to address the relief of poverty within a green agenda reflecting deep environmental concerns.

A breakthrough in quantum cryptography demonstrates that information can be encrypted and then decrypted with complete security using the combined power of quantum theory and relativity - allowing the sender to dictate the unveiling of coded information without any possibility of intrusion or manipulation.

An international team of researchers has used pioneering electron microscopy techniques to discover an important mechanism behind the reaction of metallic nanoparticles with the environment.

ANN ARBOR—Mammal body size decreased significantly during at least two ancient global warming events, a new finding that suggests a similar outcome is possible in response to human-caused climate change, according to a University of Michigan paleontologist and his colleagues.

Researchers have known for years that mammals such as primates and the groups that include horses and deer became much smaller during a period of warming, called the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), about 55 million years ago.