By using a novel technique to better understand mineral growth and dissolution, researchers at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory are improving predictions of mineral reactions and laying the groundwork for applications ranging from keeping oil pipes clear to sequestering radium.
Earth
(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– Might a penguin's next meal be affected by the exhaust from your tailpipe? The answer may be yes, when you add your exhaust fumes to the total amount of carbon dioxide lofted into the atmosphere by humans since the industrial revolution. One-third of that carbon dioxide is absorbed by the world's oceans, making them more acidic and affecting marine life.
In California's Death Valley, death is looking just a bit closer. Geologists have determined that the half-mile-wide Ubehebe Crater, formed by a prehistoric volcanic explosion, was created far more recently than previously thought—and that conditions for a sequel may exist today.
Kimberlites are magmatic rocks that form deep in the Earth's interior and are brought to the surface by volcanic eruptions. On their turbulent journey upwards magmas assimilate other types of minerals, collectively referred to as xenoliths (Greek for "foreign rocks"). The xenoliths found in kimberlite include diamonds, and the vast majority of the diamonds mined in the world today is found in kimberlite ores. Exactly how kimberlites acquire the necessary buoyancy for their long ascent through the Earth's crust has, however, been something of a mystery.
Physicists at the University of New South Wales have observed a new kind of interaction that can arise between electrons in a single-atom silicon transistor.
The findings, to be published this week in the journal Physical Review Letters, offer a more complete understanding of the mechanisms for electron transport in nanostructures at the atomic level.
"We have been able to study some of the most complicated transport mechanisms that can arise up to the single atom level," says lead author Dr Giuseppe C. Tettamanzi, from the School of Physics at UNSW.
Washington, D.C. -- Carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of coal, oil, and gas have been increasing over the past decades, causing the Earth to get hotter and hotter. There are concerns that a continuation of these trends could have catastrophic effects, including crop failures in the heat-stressed tropics. This has led some to explore drastic ideas for combating global warming, including the idea of trying to counteract it by reflecting sunlight away from the Earth.
Researchers at the RIKEN SPring-8 Center in Harima, Japan have clarified the crystal structure of quinol dependent nitric oxide reductase (qNOR), a bacterial enzyme that offers clues on the origins of our earliest oxygen-breathing ancestors. In addition to their importance to fundamental science, the findings provide key insights into the production of nitrogen oxide, an ozone-depleting and greenhouse gas hundreds of times more potent than carbon dioxide.
Getting an autism diagnosis could be more difficult in 2013 when a revised diagnostic definition goes into effect. The proposed changes may affect the proportion of individuals who qualify for a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder, according to preliminary data presented by Yale School of Medicine researchers at a meeting of the Icelandic Medical Association.
The proposed changes to the diagnostic definition would be published in the fifth edition of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5)."
University of Notre Dame nuclear physicists Philippe Collon and Michael Wiescher are using accelerated ion beams to pinpoint the age and origin of material used in pottery, painting, metalwork and other art. The results of their tests can serve as powerful forensic tools to reveal counterfeit art work, without the destruction of any sample as required in some chemical analysis.
A new insight into the impact that warmer temperatures could have across the world has been uncovered by scientists at Queen Mary, University of London.
The research, published in the journal Global Change Biology today (20 January), found that the impact of global warming could be similar across ecosystems, regardless of local environmental conditions and species.
The team, based at Queen Mary's School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, went to Iceland to study a set of geothermally-heated streams.
A new insight into the impact that warmer temperatures could have across the world has been uncovered by scientists at Queen Mary, University of London.
The research, published in the journal Global Change Biology today (20 January), found that the impact of global warming could be similar across ecosystems, regardless of local environmental conditions and species.
The team, based at Queen Mary's School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, went to Iceland to study a set of geothermally-heated streams.
The global average surface temperature in 2011 was the ninth warmest since 1880, according to NASA scientists. The finding continues a trend in which nine of the 10 warmest years in the modern meteorological record have occurred since the year 2000.
The bottom of a glacier is not the most hospitable place on Earth, but at least two types of bacteria happily live there, according to researchers.
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WASHINGTON -- While last month's climate negotiations in Durban made incremental progress toward helping farmers adapt to climate change and reduce agriculture's climate footprint, a group of international agriculture experts, writing in the January 20 issue of Science magazine, urges scientists to lay the groundwork for more decisive action on global food security in environmental negotiations in 2012.
The bottom of a glacier is not the most hospitable place on Earth, but at least two types of bacteria happily live there, according to researchers.