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Uranium a top subject at Geological Society of America Meeting

Boulder, CO, USA – More than a dozen papers to be presented next week at the Geological Society of America Annual Meeting in North Carolina touch on aspects of uranium mining, environmental contamination, leakage, sorption, geochemistry, and mineral dating. Two studies focus on the Coles Hill uranium deposit in nearby Chatham, Virginia. Another discusses environmental contamination near a uranium mine, while a fourth focusses on potential nuclear repository conditions.

The following highlighted papers will be presented on Sunday and Monday at the Charlotte Convention Center.

Taking the 'pulse' of volcanoes using satellite images

MIAMI – November 5, 2012 -- A new study by scientists at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science uses Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) data to investigate deformation prior to the eruption of active volcanoes in Indonesia's west Sunda arc. Led by geophysicist Estelle Chaussard and UM Professor Falk Amelung, the study uncovered evidence that several volcanoes did in fact 'inflate' prior to eruptions due to the rise of magma.

After long-ago mass extinction, global warming hindered species' recovery

CHARLOTTE, NC – Researchers have discovered why plants and animals had a hard time recovering from the largest mass extinction in Earth's history 250 million years ago.

The reason: global warming.

Because of environmental consequences of rising temperatures, those species that survived the extinction didn't fully recover for 5 million years.

Mountain meadows dwindling in the Pacific Northwest

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Some high mountain meadows in the Pacific Northwest are declining rapidly due to climate change, a study suggests, as reduced snowpacks, longer growing seasons and other factors allow trees to invade these unique ecosystems that once were carpeted with grasses, shrubs and wildflowers.

The process appears to have been going on for decades, but was highlighted in one recent analysis of Jefferson Park, a subalpine meadow complex in the central Oregon Cascade Range, in which tree occupation rose from 8 percent in 1950 to 35 percent in 2007.

Disaster defense: Balancing costs and benefits

Do costly seawalls provide a false sense of security in efforts to control nature? Would it be better to focus on far less expensive warning systems and improved evacuation procedures that can save many lives?

Seth Stein, a Northwestern University geologist, has teamed up with his father, Jerome Stein, an economist at Brown University, to develop new strategies to defend society against natural disasters like Hurricane Sandy as well as the effects of climate change.

World record for the entanglement of twisted light quanta

To this end, the researchers developed a new method for entangling single photons which gyrate in opposite directions. This result is a first step towards entangling and twisting even macroscopic, spatially separated objects in two different directions.

Temporary storage for electrons: Natural method of producing hydrogen

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Energy Conversion (MPI CEC) and the Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) have found through spectroscopic investigations on a hydrogen-producing enzyme that the environment of the catalytic site acts as an electron reservoir in the enzyme. Thus, it can very efficiently produce hydrogen, which has great potential as a renewable energy source. The research team describes their results in the journal "Angewandte Chemie".

Producing hydrogen with enzymes

California is home to extreme weather, too

MERCED, Calif. — California isn't going to face a superstorm like Hurricane Sandy because the Pacific Ocean is too cold to feed that kind of weather system.

But that doesn't mean California won't see extreme weather, say researchers from the University of California, Merced.

Iowa State, Ames Lab researchers find 3 unique cell-to-cell bonds

AMES, Iowa – The human body has more than a trillion cells, most of them connected, cell to neighboring cells.

How, exactly, do those bonds work? What happens when a pulling force is applied to those bonds? How long before they break? Does a better understanding of all those bonds and their responses to force have implications for fighting disease?

Bristol scientists perform new experiment to solve the 'one real mystery' of quantum mechanics

What is light made of: waves or particles? This basic question has fascinated physicists since the early days of science. Quantum mechanics predicts that photons, particles of light, are both particles and waves simultaneously. Reporting in Science, physicists from the University of Bristol give a new demonstration of this wave-particle duality of photons, dubbed the 'one real mystery of quantum mechanics' by Nobel Prize laureate Richard Feynman.

Why seas are rising ahead of predictions

Boulder, CO, USA – Sea levels are rising faster than expected from global warming, and University of Colorado geologist Bill Hay has a good idea why. The last official IPCC report in 2007 projected a global sea level rise between 0.2 and 0.5 meters by the year 2100. But current sea-level rise measurements meet or exceed the high end of that range and suggest a rise of one meter or more by the end of the century.

Scientists launch international study of open-fire cooking and air quality

BOULDER -- Expanding its focus on the link between the atmosphere and human health, the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) is launching a three-year, international study into the impact of open-fire cooking on regional air quality and disease.

The study will break new ground by bringing together atmospheric scientists, engineers, statisticians, and social scientists who will analyze the effects of smoke from traditional cooking methods on households, villages, and entire regions.

Anthropocene continues to spark scientific debate

Boulder, CO, USA – How have humans influenced Earth? Can geoscientists measure when human impacts began overtaking those of Earth's other inhabitants and that of the natural Earth system? Responding to increasing scientific recognition that humans have become the foremost agent of change at Earth's surface, organizers of this GSA technical session have brought together speakers and poster presentations from a variety of sources in order to answer these questions and define the "Geomorphology of the Anthropocene."

Plants 'surveillance' systems recognize pathogenic and beneficial microorganisms

Plant roots are surrounded by thousands of bacteria and fungi living in the soil and on the root surface. To survive in this diverse environment, plants employ sophisticated detection systems to distinguish pathogenic microorganisms from beneficial microorganisms.

Here the so-called chitin molecules from microorganisms, along with modified versions, play an important role as they are detected by the plant surveillance system. Legumes, for example, build a defence against pathogenic microorganisms in response to simple chitin molecules.

Pond skating insects reveal water-walking secrets

This month's special issue of Physics World is devoted to animal physics, and includes science writer Stephen Ornes explanation of how pond skaters effortlessly skip across water leaving nothing but a small ripple in their wake.

As Ornes writes, our current understanding of the mechanisms adopted by the pond skater is down to the efforts of David Hu, who as a mathematics graduate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology spent four years studying their behaviour.