SANTA CRUZ, CA--Among the oddities of the outer solar system are the middle-sized moons of Saturn, a half-dozen icy bodies dwarfed by Saturn's massive moon Titan. According to a new model for the origin of the Saturn system, these middle-sized moons were spawned during giant impacts in which several major satellites merged to form Titan.
Heavens
Salt marshes have been disintegrating and dying over the past two decades along the U.S. Eastern Seaboard and other highly developed coastlines without anyone fully understanding why.
This week in the journal Nature, scientist Linda Deegan of the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) in Woods Hole, Mass., and colleagues report that nutrients--such as nitrogen and phosphorus from septic and sewer systems and lawn fertilizers--can cause salt marsh loss.
The giant impact believed to have formed the Earth-Moon system has long been accepted as canon. However, a major challenge to the theory has been that the Earth and Moon have identical oxygen isotope compositions, even though earlier impact models indicated they should differ substantially.
The authors of this paper propose a framework for a European-wide network for systematic GMO impact assessment. This network aims at improving the regulatory system by enhancing and harmonizing the environmental risk assessment process and post-market environmental monitoring of GM crops in the EU.
MADISON – In 1986, when Voyager swept past Uranus, the probe's portraits of the planet were "notoriously bland," disappointing scientists, yielding few new details of the planet and its atmosphere, and giving it a reputation as a bore of the solar system.
Now, however, thanks to a new technique applied at the Keck Observatory, Uranus is coming into sharp focus through high-resolution infrared images, revealing in incredible detail the bizarre weather of the seventh planet from the sun.
WOODS HOLE, Mass.—Salt marshes have been disintegrating and dying over the past two decades along the U.S. Eastern seaboard and other highly developed coastlines, without anyone fully understanding why. This week in the journal Nature, MBL Ecosystems Center scientist Linda Deegan and colleagues report that nutrients—such as nitrogen and phosphorus from septic and sewer systems and lawn fertilizers—can cause salt-marsh loss.
It's a big claim, but Washington University in St. Louis planetary scientist Frédéric Moynier says his group has discovered evidence that the Moon was born in a flaming blaze of glory when a body the size of Mars collided with the early Earth.
European astronomers have discovered a planet with about the mass of the Earth orbiting a star in the Alpha Centauri system — the nearest to Earth. It is also the lightest exoplanet ever discovered around a star like the Sun. The planet was detected using the HARPS instrument on the 3.6-metre telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory in Chile. The results will appear online in the journal Nature on 17 October 2012.
BATON ROUGE – LSU's John Fleeger, professor emeritus in LSU's Department of Biological Sciences, is part of a multi-disciplinary national research group that recently discovered the impact of nutrient enrichment on salt marsh ecosystems is marsh loss and that such loss is seen much faster than previously thought.
Fresh examinations of lunar rocks gathered by Apollo mission astronauts have yielded new insights about the moon's chemical makeup as well as clues about the giant impacts that may have shaped the early beginnings of Earth and the moon.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — There's a new contender in the race to find an inexpensive alternative to platinum catalysts for use in hydrogen fuel cells.
Brown University chemist Shouheng Sun and his students have developed a new material — a graphene sheet covered by cobalt and cobalt-oxide nanoparticles — that can catalyze the oxygen reduction reaction nearly as well as platinum does and is substantially more durable.
European astronomers have discovered a planet with about the mass of the Earth orbiting a star in the Alpha Centauri system — the nearest to Earth. It is also the lightest exoplanet ever discovered around a star like the Sun. The planet was detected using the HARPS instrument on the 3.6-metre telescope at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile.
The song "How do you solve a problem like Maria?" from the famous film "The Sound of Music" comes to mind when looking at NASA satellite imagery of Tropical Storm Maria churning in the western North Pacific Ocean. The answer lies in increased wind shear and cool ocean temperatures – two factors that can weaken the storm, but won't be present over the next day or two.
NASA's Aqua satellite captured a stunning image of Hurricane Paul in the eastern Pacific Ocean that revealed Mexico's Socorro Island was just outside of Paul's eye. Now, Paul is expected to track along the Baja California coast, triggering more warnings.
Hurricane Paul is stirring up rough seas in the eastern Pacific Ocean and warnings are posted along Baja California.
Satellite imagery from NASA's TRMM satellite showed that wind shear is pushing the bulk of rainfall away from the center of Tropical Storm Anais.