Earth | Page 903 | Science Codex

Study of Brazilian Amazon shows 50,000 km of road was built in just 3 years

Nearly 17,000 kilometres of road were built in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest every year between 2004 and 2007.

Although road-building is a major contributor to deforestation and habitat loss, the way in which road networks develop is still poorly understood.

A new study is among the first to measure the number of roads built in a rainforest ecosystem over an extended period of time. It was published this month in the journal Regional Environmental Change by researchers including two Life Scientists from Imperial College London.

Quantum reality more complex than previously thought

Imagine you order a delivery of several glass vases in different colors. Each vase is sent as a separate parcel. What would you think of the courier if the parcels arrive apparently undamaged, yet when you open them, it turns out that all the red vases are intact and all the green ones are smashed to pieces? Physicists from the University of Warsaw and the Gdansk University of Technology have demonstrated that when quantum information is transmitted, nature can be as whimsical as this crazy delivery man.

A noble yet simple way to synthesize new metal-free electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction reaction

Ulsan, S. Korea, Oct 28, 2013 – A Korean research team from Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST), S. Korea, developed a high performance and stable metal-free electrocatalyst for ORR and the research work was published in a science journal, Nanoscale by the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC). (Title: "Covalent Functionalization Based Heteroatom Doped Graphene Nanosheet as a Metal-Free Electrocatalysts for Oxygen Reduction Reaction")

The cyber-centipede: From Linnaeus to big data

Taxonomic descriptions, introduced by Linnaeus in 1735, are designed to allow scientists to tell one species from another. Now there is a new futuristic method for describing new species that goes far beyond the tradition. The new approach combines several techniques, including next generation molecular methods, barcoding, and novel computing and imaging technologies, that will test the model for big data collection, storage and management in biology. The study has just been published in the Biodiversity Data Journal.

Urban underground holds sustainable energy

Vast energy sources are slumbering below big cities. Sustaina-ble energies for heating in winter and cooling in summer may be extracted from heated groundwater aquifers. Researchers from KIT and ETH Zurich developed an analytical heat flux model and found that increasing heat in the underground is mainly caused by an increase in surface temperatures and heat release from buildings. Work of the scientists is now reported in the renowned journal "Environmental Science and Technology" (DOI: 10.1021/es401546u).

El Niño is becoming more active

A new approach to analyzing paleo-climate reconstructions of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon resolves disagreements and reveals that ENSO activity during the 20th century has been unusually high compared to the past 600 years. The results are published in Climate of the Past by a team of scientists from the University of New South Wales, the University of Hawaii International Pacific Research Center and the NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory.

What do we know -- and not know -- about fracking?

Boulder, Colo., USA - Fracking is in the headlines a lot these days, and everyone has an opinion about it. But how much do we really know for certain about the oil and gas extraction technique and its health effects? And how do we find out the truth among all the shouted opinions? To help cut through the static, several scientists have put together a multidisciplinary session on fracking and health at the meeting of The Geological Society of America (GSA) in Denver on Sunday.

Scientists eye longer-term forecasts of US heat waves

BOULDER -- Scientists have fingerprinted a distinctive atmospheric wave pattern high above the Northern Hemisphere that can foreshadow the emergence of summertime heat waves in the United States more than two weeks in advance.

The new research, led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), could potentially enable forecasts of the likelihood of U.S. heat waves 15-20 days out, giving society more time to prepare for these often-deadly events.

Radioactive waste: Where to put it?

Boulder, CO, USA — As the U.S. makes new plans for disposing of spent nuclear fuel and other high-level radioactive waste deep underground, geologists are key to identifying safe burial sites and techniques. Scientists at The Geological Society of America (GSA) meeting in Denver will describe the potential of shale formations; challenges of deep borehole disposal; and their progress in building a computer model to help improve understanding of the geologic processes that are important for safe disposal of high-level waste.

Sandy's lessons include: Put parks, not houses, on the beach

Boulder, CO, USA - Just days before Hurricane Sandy hit the New York and New Jersey coastline on 29 October 2012, scientists from the City University of New York's (CUNY) College of Staten Island had produced the most detailed model to date of the region's potential for damage from big storms. So naturally, the morning after the floods receded from Staten Island, CUNY geology professor Alan I. Benimoff was out mapping the high-water marks in the flooded neighborhoods. There he discovered that his team's pre-Sandy model had been right on the money.

Treasures found and lost in US National Parks

Boulder, CO, USA - U.S. National Parks are not just beautiful vistas and great family vacation destinations; they are also key scientific field laboratories and rich repositories of the record of Earth's history. Some recent discoveries to emerge from scientists working in U.S. National Parks will be presented in two sessions, Geology in the National Parks: Research, Mapping, and Resource Management I and II, at the 125th Anniversary meeting of The Geological Society of America in Denver next week.

Some abstracts of interest include:

ASU, Georgia Tech create breakthrough for solar cell efficiency

Did you know that crystals form the basis for the penetrating icy blue glare of car headlights and could be fundamental to the future in solar energy technology?

Crystals are at the heart of diodes. Not the kind you might find in quartz, formed naturally, but manufactured to form alloys, such as indium gallium nitride or InGaN. This alloy forms the light emitting region of LEDs, for illumination in the visible range, and of laser diodes (LDs) in the blue-UV range.

Green algae move to the beat

The beating of flagella is one of the basic principles of movement in the cellular cosmos. However, up to now, scientists were unsure as to how the movements of several of these small cellular appendages are synchronised. Dresden-based researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics and the MPI for the Physics of Complex Systems have now succeeded in demonstrating how the green alga Chlamydomonas synchronises the movements of its two flagella using a resourceful rocking movement.

Reading ancient climate from plankton shells

Climate changes from millions of years ago are recorded at daily rate in ancient sea shells, new research shows.

A huge X-ray microscope has revealed growth bands in plankton shells that show how shell chemistry records the sea temperature.

The results could allow scientists to chart short timescale changes in ocean temperatures hundreds of millions of years ago.

Plankton shells show features like tree rings, recording historical climate.

Scientists' new approach improves efficiency of solar cells

An international team of scientists, led by researchers from the Universities of York and St Andrews, has developed a new method to increase the efficiency of solar cells.

The new approach achieves highly efficient broad-band light trapping in thin films, with more light captured in the film in order to maximise absorption and electricity generation.