Earth

DENVER, Aug. 28, 2011 — Billions of people owe their lives to nitrogen fertilizers — a pillar of the fabled Green Revolution in agriculture that averted global famine in the 20th century — but few are aware that nitrogen pollution from fertilizers and other sources has become a major environmental problem that threatens human health and welfare in multiple ways, a scientist said here today.

DENVER, Aug. 28, 2011 — How do diamonds the size of potatoes shoot up at 40 miles per hour from their birthplace 100 miles below Earth's surface? Does a secret realm of life exist inside the Earth? Is there more oil and natural gas than anyone dreams, with oil forming not from the remains of ancient fossilized plants and animals near the surface, but naturally deep, deep down there? Can the greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, be transformed into a pure solid mineral?

While a great number of people are preparing to evacuate in the face of what may or may not be a Hurricane name Irene, Andrew Kennedy, a researcher in the University of Notre Dame Department of Civil Engineering and Geological Sciences, rushed to the outer banks of North Carolina yesterday in anticipation of its arrival.

Kennedy, a member of Notre Dame's Hydraulic Computation Research Group, is on a helicopter rapidly deploying wave and surge gauges for data collection in conjunction with Irene.

CHAMPAIGN, IL (August 26, 2011) – Eggs produced by free-range hens are often perceived by the public to be nutritionally superior to eggs obtained from layers kept in traditional battery cages. However, a recent scientific study has called this popular perception into question by finding essentially no differences in the nutritional quality of eggs produced by hens from both management systems, said the Poultry Science Association (PSA).The findings also showed that cholesterol levels in all eggs were lower than U.S.

BATAVIA, Illinois -- The physics community got a jolt last year when results showed for the first time that neutrinos and their antimatter counterparts, antineutrinos, might be the odd man out in the particle world and have different masses. This idea was something that went against most commonly accepted theories of how the subatomic world works.

Hurricane Irene is a major hurricane, and NASA satellite data shows its diameter is now about one-third the length of the U.S. Atlantic coastline. Meanwhile, far in the eastern Atlantic Ocean a tenth tropical depression formed. One satellite image captured both storms and shows the tremendous difference in their size.

CHAMPAIGN, lll. — Researchers have engineered new sensors that fluoresce in the presence of compounds that interact with estrogen receptors in human cells. The sensors detect natural or human-made substances that alter estrogenic signaling in the body.

The study appears in the journal Biotechnology and Bioengineering.

In the waters off the North Carolina coast, historically-significant World War II submarines and shipwrecks rest on the seafloor, a testament to a relatively unknown chapter in U.S. history. According to a new NOAA report, the shipwrecks are not only important for their cultural value, but also as habitat for a wide diversity of fishes, invertebrates and algal species. Additionally, due to their unique location within an important area for biological productivity, the shipwrecks are potential sites for examining community change.

After returning from holiday, it's likely you felt that the journey home by plane, car or train went much quicker than the outward journey, even though in fact both distances and journey are usually the same. So why the difference? According to a new study by Niels van de Ven and his colleagues it seems that many people find that, when taking a trip, the way back seems shorter.

Strains of a bacterium commonly found in fruit flies can prevent the Aedes aegypti mosquito from transmitting the virus that causes dengue fever, researchers have found. Their discovery could lead to a more effective way to control dengue worldwide.

The largest earthquake to hit Virginia in more than a century struck Louisa County yesterday.

The 5.9 magnitude earthquake hit Virginia at 1:51 p.m. on August 23, but the effects were felt in several states including Washington, New York City and North Carolina. See here for how magnitudes of earthquakes are calculated.

Wheezy toddlers who have a sensitivity to house dust mites are more at risk of developing asthma by the age of 12, a University of Melbourne led study has shown.

Children aged one – two years with a family history of allergy, who had a positive skin prick test to house dust mites, had a higher risk of developing asthma later in life. Results showed 75 per cent of these children had asthma at aged 12 compared to 36 per cent of children without a positive skin prick test.

A new, estimated total number of species on Earth, the most precise calculation ever offered (which still means outrageously imprecise) says there are 6.5 million species on land and 2.2 million dwelling in the ocean depths.

Margin of error - at least 1 million and likely a lot more.

Announced today by Census of Marine Life scientists, the figure is based on an analytical technique that narrows the range of previous estimates; the number of species on Earth was said to fall somewhere between 3 million and 100 million.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — A new physics-based theory could give researchers a deeper understanding of the unusual, slow dynamics of liquids composed of large polymers. This advance provides a better picture of how polymer molecules respond under fast-flow, high-stress processing conditions for plastics and other polymeric materials.

Kenneth S. Schweizer, the G. Ronald and Margaret H. Professor of materials science and engineering at the University of Illinois, and graduate student Daniel Sussman published their findings in the journal Physical Review Letters.