Earth

WASHINGTON – Physicians and nurses have a role if not "a moral and professional responsibility to act" to help to reduce climate change and help those impacted, say the authors of "Climate Change & Health: Is There a Role for the Health Care Sector?," published by the Catholic Health Association of the United States.

Research led by scientists at the American Museum of Natural History shows that ammonites—an extinct type of shelled mollusk that's closely related to modern-day nautiluses and squids—made homes in the unique environments surrounding methane seeps in the seaway that once covered America's Great Plains. The findings, published online on April 10 in the journal Geology, provide new insights into the mode of life and habitat of these ancient animals.

Scientists and engineers at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) have discovered an entirely new carbon-based material that is synthesized from the "wonder kid" of the carbon family, graphene. The discovery, which the researchers are calling "graphene monoxide (GMO)," pushes carbon materials closer to ushering in next-generation electronics.

Electron microscopy, conducted as part of the Shared Research Equipment (ShaRE) User Program at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has led to a new theory to explain intriguing properties in a material with potential applications in capacitors and actuators.

Marine researchers have definitively linked the collapse of oyster seed production at a commercial oyster hatchery in Oregon to an increase in ocean acidification.

Larval growth at the hatchery declined to a level considered by the owners to be "non-economically viable."

A study by the scientists found that increased seawater carbon dioxide (CO2) levels, resulting in more corrosive ocean water, inhibited the larval oysters from developing their shells and growing at a pace that would make commercial production cost-effective.

Washington, D.C. — How hydrogen--the most abundant element in the cosmos--responds to extremes of pressure and temperature is one of the major challenges in modern physical science. Moreover, knowledge gleaned from experiments using hydrogen as a testing ground on the nature of chemical bonding can fundamentally expand our understanding of matter. New work from Carnegie scientists has enabled researchers to examine hydrogen under pressures never before possible. Their work is published online in Physical Review Letters.

Imagine a world where the rooftops and pavements of every urban area are resurfaced to increase the reflection of the Sun's light rays. Well, this is exactly what a group of Canadian researchers have done in an attempt to measure the potential effects against global warming.

In a study published today, 13 April, in IOP Publishing's journal Environmental Research Letters, researchers from Concordia University created this scenario to see what effect a global increase in surface reflectance would have on global temperature and our own carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

Meat consumption in the developed world needs to be cut by 50 per cent per person by 2050 if we are to meet the most aggressive strategy, set out by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), to reduce one of the most important greenhouse gases, nitrous oxide (N2O).

This is the finding from a new study, published today, 13 April, in IOP Publishing's Environmental Research Letters, which also claims that N2O emissions from the industrial and agricultural sectors will also need to be cut by 50 per cent if targets are to be met.

Two new studies into the "plumbing systems" that lie under volcanoes could bring scientists closer to understanding plate ruptures and predicting eruptions—both of which are important steps for protecting the public from earthquake and volcanic hazards.

International teams of researchers, including two scientists from the University of Rochester, have been studying the location and behaviour of magma chambers on the Earth's mid-ocean ridge system—a vast chain of volcanoes along which the Earth forms new crust.

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(Boston) – Researchers at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) have identified a gene that plays a key role in regulating inflammatory response and homeostasis. These findings could help lead to the development of innovative methods to reduce the inflammation associated with cancer, type 2 diabetes and other diseases.

BANGKOK (12 APRIL 2012)—Severe outbreaks of new, invasive pests triggered by rising temperatures could threaten Southeast Asia's multi-billion dollar cassava industry, as well as the livelihoods of the hundreds of thousands of small farmers that rely on the crop for income, according to research from the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT).

Bangkok -- As Asia's monsoon season begins, leading climate specialists and agricultural scientists warned today that rapid climate change and its potential to intensify droughts and floods could threaten Asia's rice production and pose a significant threat to millions of people across the region.

San Francisco, April 12, 2012 -- Scientists will convene in San Diego to present the latest seismological research at the annual conference of the Seismological Society of America (SSA), April 17-19.

This year's meeting is expected to draw a record number of registrants, with more than 630 scientists in attendance, and will feature 292 oral presentations and 239 poster presentations.

Boulder, Colo., USA - New Geosphere science covers volcanic activity in the Lake Tahoe-Reno-Carson City area and its tie to abundant seismicity in the region; mapping of the interpreted locations of the Kern Canyon and Breckenridge faults at a level of detail never before published; a study of sediments in Reno-Verdi area, Western Nevada, that provide a record of a warmer, wetter climate featuring large mammal fossils; and answers to some of the puzzles surrounding the Ancestral Rocky Mountains.