“There are two kinds of fool. One says, ‘This is old, and therefore good.’ And one says, ‘This is new, and therefore better.'”
— John Brunner
“There are two kinds of fool. One says, ‘This is old, and therefore good.’ And one says, ‘This is new, and therefore better.'”
— John Brunner
Food: it was nice while we had it – Open-air field trials of five major food crops grown under carbon-dioxide levels projected for the future are harvesting dramatically less bounty than those raised in earlier greenhouse and other enclosed test conditions – and scientists warn that global food supplies could be at risk without changes in production strategies. According to the analysis, published in the June 30 issue of the journal Science, crop yields are running at about 50 percent below conclusions drawn previously from enclosed test conditions.
Birds that migrate long distances have adapted to the world’s changing climate in unexpected ways, a study shows. As the planet warms, and spring arrives earlier in Europe, birds are being forced to change their migration patterns. It had been thought that birds traveling long distances from Africa to Europe would be unable to adapt. But a study in Science suggests they have evolved in response to climate change and are returning earlier.
The future of the International Space Station, as well as that of the shuttle program itself, hinges on the flight of the shuttle Discovery (launch currently on hold due to weather). NASA Administrator Michael Griffin has said that the loss of a third orbiter would end the shuttle program. That scenario would ground manned US spaceflight until the completion of the shuttle’s successor, the Crew Exploration Vehicle, now planned for 2014.
Transparent jellyfish-like creatures known as salps, considered by many a low member in the ocean food web, may be more important to the fate of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide in the ocean than previously thought. Scientists report that salps, about the size of a human thumb, swarming by the billions in “hot spots” may be transporting tons of carbon per day from the ocean surface to the deep sea and keep it from re-entering the atmosphere.
After 11 tense days, NASA engineers on Friday were able to reactivate the Hubble Space Telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, prompting huge sighs of relief among astronomers around the world.
Ocean circulation changes during the present warm interglacial were more extensive than previously thought, according to new research.
Activity at Indonesia’s Mount Merapi has been decreasing and officials are reviewing the volcano’s top alert status, a scientist said Saturday.
Important new measures to protect Antarctica from invasive non-native species have been agreed at a meeting of Antarctic experts in Edinburgh. However, the effort may be too late – some alien species have already established themselves at the icy wilderness.
Researchers have developed a safe replacement for the fumigant methyl bromide that uses nothing more than carbon dioxide, a vacuum pump and a little alcohol.
And in a story reminiscent of John Brunner’s novel “The Sheep Look Up,” two German tourists suffered burns on a Latvian beach after picking up pieces of phosphorus that they thought were amber, hospital officials said Friday. The phosphorus waste is from military exercises by the former Soviet Union in the area.
Link
ROME, June 30 — Scientists who engage in stem cell research using human embryos should be subject to excommunication from the Roman Catholic Church, according to a senior Vatican official.
Cardinal Alfonso López Trujillo, who heads the group that proposes family-related policy for the church, said in an interview with the Catholic weekly Famiglia Cristiana published Thursday that stem cell researchers should be punished in the same way as women who have abortions and doctors who perform them.
Oh, it’s not official policy yet, but this cardinal who’s making all the noise is very influential in making that policy. I was brought up Catholic and it breaks my heart to see this.
oops… the title is supposed to read “Excommunication Is Sought for Stem Cell Researchers”
Link
Loss of access to collections will hamper emergency response and research.
Washington, DC – In an extraordinary letter of protest, representatives for 10,000 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency scientists are asking Congress to stop the Bush administration from closing the agency’s network of technical research libraries. The EPA scientists, representing more than half of the total agency workforce, contend thousands of scientific studies are being put out of reach, hindering emergency preparedness, anti-pollution enforcement and long-term research, according to the letter released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).
In his proposed budget for FY 2007, President Bush deleted $2 million of support for EPA’s libraries, amounting to 80% of the agency’s total budget for libraries. Without waiting for Congress to act, EPA has begun shuttering libraries, closing access to collections and reassigning staff. The letter notes that “EPA library services are [now] greatly reduced or no longer available to the general public” in agency regional offices serving 19 states.
[snip]
[the following was pointed out in a letter to Congress by the scientists:]
* “The ability of EPA to respond to emergencies will be reduced” due to a diminishing access to “the latest research on cutting-edge homeland security and public health” topics;
* Approximately 50,000 original research documents will become completely unavailable because they are not available electronically and the agency has no budget for digitizing them; and
* The public and academic researchers may lose any access to EPA library materials as services to the public are being axed and there are no plans to maintain “the inter-library loan process.”