and mortality in the US said a study co-author Michael Weitzman MD a professor of Pediatrics and of Environmental Medicine at the NYULMC.
However the reduction in the numbers of stomatal pores decreases the ability of plants to cool their leaves during a heat wave via water evaporation.
and EPF2 could be used to engineer crop varieties which are better able to perform in the current and future high CO2 global climate where fresh water availability for agriculture is dwindling. â#The discoveries of these proteins
and CO2 levels continue to rise. â#oeat a time where the pressing issues of climate change and inherent agronomic consequences
and climate change modelersâ#says Engineer. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by University of California-San diego. The original article was written by Kim Mcdonald.
were described in an article published in the online version of the journal Nature Climate Change.
and control in Great britain demonstrated that the majority of herd outbreaks are caused by multiple transmissions routes--including failed cattle infection tests cattle movement and reinfection from environmental reservoirs (infected pastures and wildlife).
whilst badgers form part of the environmental reservoir they only play a relatively minor role in the transmission of infection.
and the local environment that are driving the front of the epidemic. Imperfect cattle skin tests contribute to the spread by delaying the time until infected herds are detected for the first time
It's also a global problem particularly in drier grain-growing environments. Boron tolerant lines of wheat however can maintain good root growth in boron toxic soils
and adaptation to environmental stresses have remained extremely challenging to identify. Advances in molecular biology and genetics technologies of the past few years coupled with the extensive collections of wheat genetic material available around the world have paved the way for a new era in the analysis of complex genomes such as
and the knowledge to select for the right variants of the tolerance gene needed to do the job in specific environments says Dr Sutton.
#A case study of manta rays and lagoonsdouglas Mccauley a new assistant professor in UC Santa barbara's Department of Ecology Evolution and Marine Biology does fieldwork in one of the most isolated places in the world--Palmyra Atoll.
and his colleagues chose to study the ecology of Manta alfredi. Manta rays are classified as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature
or even assess it we need to learn some basic things about their ecology. So we did just that.
We used high-resolution animal tracking tools to describe in as much detail as we could the ecology of the mantas
Because we were trying to produce a more complete picture of manta ray ecology we had to use a toolkit that pulled out different fleeting pictures
#Deforestation remedies can have unintended consequenceswhen it comes to fixing deforestation and forest degradation good intentions can lead to bad outcomes.
Deforestation continues at a rapid pace in much of South america Southeast asia and the Congo Basin.
That destruction is linked to loss of habitat for wildlife soil erosion and even accelerated climate change.
The authors say itâ##s possible to minimize environmental impacts if decision-makers pay attention to ecosystem structure composition and dynamics.
They shouldnâ##t base everything on a single statistic such as the total land area occupied by forest especially
when thereâ##s technically no net deforestation tropical forests can still suffer. For example if degraded natural forests are replaced by plantations of invasive exotic trees
or low water-use efficiency trees biodiversity will diminish wildlife could suffer and soil erosion could render streams unusable by local villagers. â#oewhen you save a forest from deforestation itâ##s great
but you might not have gotten the full package of what you wantedâ#he said. The discussion Putz said needs to center on the definition of â#oeforest. â#The Food
of grazers in the region according to the latest report by the Global Coral reef Monitoring Network (GCRMN) the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the United nations Environment Programme (UNEP.
and make them more resilient to future climate change impacts. The rate at which the Caribbean corals have been declining is truly alarming says Carl Gustaf Lundin Director of IUCN's Global Marine and Polar Programme.
Climate change has long been thought to be the main culprit in coral degradation. While it does pose a serious threat by making oceans more acidic
The loss of these species breaks the delicate balance of coral ecosystems and allows algae on
and coastal development are more resilient to pressures from climate change according to the authors. Even if we could somehow make climate change disappear tomorrow these reefs would continue their decline says Jeremy Jackson lead author of the report and IUCN's senior advisor on coral reefs.
We must immediately address the grazing problem for the reefs to stand any chance of surviving future climate shifts.
The report also shows that some of the healthiest Caribbean coral reefs are those that harbour vigorous populations of grazing parrotfish.
which are one of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet. Caribbean reefs spanning a total of 38 countries are vital to the region's economy.
The decline in corals started long before climate change began to affect reefs says Terry Hughes author of the 1994 study that predicted the current problems due to parrotfish removal.
despite their enormous ecological and economic value says Jerker Tamelander head of the UNEP coral reef unit.
1970-2012 was published by the GCRMN and IUCN with the support from The International Coral reef Initiative (ICRI) the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral reef Studies United states State department United nations Environment Programme (UNEP
and how climate change may affect dietary preferences of herbivorous insects. This research was presented at the Society for Experimental Biology Annual Meeting 2014 held at Manchester University UK from the 1st--4th of July.
The research could have far-reaching implications for how we manage agricultural land and native ecosystems.
In a paper published in the scientific journal New Phytologist plant ecologist Nishanth Tharayil and graduate student Mioko Tamura show that invasive plants can accelerate the greenhouse effect by releasing carbon stored in soil into the atmosphere.
Since soil stores more carbon than both the atmosphere and terrestrial vegetation combined the repercussions for how we manage agricultural land
and ecosystems to facilitate the storage of carbon could be dramatic. In their study Tamura and Tharayil examined the impact of encroachment of Japanese knotweed and kudzu two of North america's most widespread invasive plants on the soil carbon storage in native ecosystems.
They found that kudzu invasion released carbon that was stored in native soils while the carbon amassed in soils invaded by knotweed is more prone to oxidation
Our findings highlight the capacity of invasive plants to effect climate change by destabilizing the carbon pool in soil
Climate change is causing massive range expansion of many exotic and invasive plant species. As the climate warms kudzu will continue to invade northern ecosystems
and leaves the vicinity of the sun and addresses questions about why that happens. During Rosetta flybys of the asteroids (2867) Steins and (21) Lutetia in 2008 and 2010 respectively the instrument measured thermal emission from these asteroids and searched for water vapor.
In wealthier developing countries there has been a significant increase in public demand for conservation which has not yet been matched by an equivalent increase in protective actions by the governments of those countries said Jeffrey R. Vincent a Duke environmental economist who led the study
This could make a big difference in protecting tropical biodiversity and reducing greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation.
and results from public opinion surveys about the priority governments should place on environmental protection in relation to potentially opposing concerns such as job creation.
Vincent is the Clarence F. Korstian Professor of Forest Economics and Management at Duke's Nicholas School of the Environment and Sanford School of Public Policy.
Primary funding came from the Global Environmental Facility through the UN Development Programme with additional support from Malaysia's Ministry of Natural resources and Environment and the Forest Research Institute Malaysia.
and pests as well as their outstanding performance in landscapes Earth-Kindâ roses can thrive in most environments even with limited care.
In arid and semiarid regions high soil salinity is the result of low rainfall and high evapotranspiration while in northern regions it is caused by deicing salts.
past environmental conditions in the Arctic ocean. Oxygen isotopes in ancient bones and teeth reflect the water animals are living in
because they indicated an essentially freshwater environment. The team analyzed 30 fossil sand tiger shark teeth exhumed from Banks Island
Despite the six months of darkness each year the terrestrial Arctic climate included warm humid summers
To finally get some data on the Eocene marine environment using these shark teeth will help us to begin filling in the gaps.
The Eocene lamniform group of sharks had a much broader environmental window than lamniform sharks do today.
Eberle and Kim said the early-middle Eocene greenhouse period from 53 to 38 million years ago is used as a deep-time analog by climate scientists for
what a runaway greenhouse effect potentially could look like. Through an analysis of fossil sand tiger shark teeth from the western Arctic ocean this study offers new evidence for a less salty Arctic ocean during an ancient'greenhouse period'says Yusheng Chris Liu program
The clearing of tropical forests to plant oil palm trees releases massive amounts of carbon dioxide a greenhouse gas fueling climate change.
Converting diverse forest ecosystems to these single-crop monocultures degrades or destroys wildlife habitat. Oil palm plantations also have been associated with dangerous and abusive conditions for laborers.
Although we previously documented carbon emissions from land use conversion to oil palm we were stunned by how these oil palm plantations profoundly alter freshwater ecosystems for decades said study co-author
and team leader Lisa M. Curran a professor of ecological anthropology at Stanford and a senior fellow at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment.
and the study's lead author Kimberly Carlson a former Stanford graduate student who is now a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Minnesota's Institute on the Environment.
because this study is one of the first to examine the oil palm's effects on freshwater ecosystems.
and diverse smallholder agricultural lands to oil palm plantations may be almost as harmful to stream ecosystems as clearing intact forests.
Very few protections for such non-intact forest ecosystems exist. According to Curran extensive land conversion to oil palm plantations could lead to a perfect storm combining the crop's environmental effects with those from a massive El Niã o-associated drought.
One is predicted this fall. This could cause collapse of freshwater ecosystems and significant social and economic hardships in a region Curran said.
Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by Stanford university. The original article was written by Rob Jordan.
They didn't slow down--birth rates were expanding right up to the depopulation said Kohler. Why not limit growth?
but within 30 years it was empty leaving a mystery that has consumed several archaeological careers including Kohler's. Perhaps the population got too large to feed itself as climates deteriorated
and erosion control determining the best method for establishing a uniform and dense cover crop stand as soon as possible after planting is a critical first step.
and distribution components of field-grown trees will help nursery managers understand the environmental costs associated with their respective systems
and promoting products that offer environmental benefits can be one way to differentiate horticultural products in a competitive marketplace.
but reduce their environmental risks or impacts as well. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by American Society for Horticultural Science.
Changes in Weather Can Heat up or Stifle Funjuly is when things start to really heat up
or a refreshing cool breeze sudden changes in the weather can trigger an asthma attack. Allergists are experts in diagnosing
Keeping an eye on the weather and knowing how changes might affect your asthma will go a long way towards helping you enjoy the summer season.
and stay hydrated during hot weather periods. If You Don't Bother It It Won't (Ouch! Bother Youno one wants to get stung by an insect
#Green spaces in cities may increase erosion of building materials such as stone, concrete and steelgreen spaces in towns
When organic chemicals from trees and vegetation mix with air pollutants the resulting corrosive gas can increase the erosion of building materials including stone concrete and steel.
Southampton's Dr Abhishek Tiwary who is based within the Centre for Environmental sciences and Dr Prashant Kumar from the University of Surrey found that heritage buildings built from limestone
When organic chemicals from trees and vegetation mix with air pollutants the resulting corrosive gas can increase the erosion of building materials including stone concrete and steel.
Southampton's Dr Abhishek Tiwary who is based within the Centre for Environmental sciences and Dr Prashant Kumar from the University of Surrey found that heritage buildings built from limestone
#More carbohydrates make trees more resistant to droughthow well tropical trees weather periods of drought depends on the carbohydrates stored as revealed by a novel experiment conducted by an international team of researchers headed by ecologists from the University of Zurich in contribution
The findings are extremely important for assessing the resistance of tropical forests to climate change and reforestation.
Consequently there are grave concerns that the rainfall patterns altered by climate change could trigger a forest decline on a global scale.
According to climate researchers Switzerland is affected also: The climate models even project hotter and drier summers for this country.
An international research team headed by Michael O'brien an ecologist at the University of Zurich is now studying
which factors govern the resistance of tropical trees to periods of drought. As the scientists reveal in their study published in Nature Climate Change stored carbohydrates play a key role in the resilience of the individual plant. 1400 saplings of ten species monitoredwhile stored starch
and soluble sugar in plant tissues were thought to influence the resistance and resilience of trees positively during periods of drought this supposition had not been proven.
As different trees display a different mortality due to aridity the impact of a forest decline triggered by climate change is cushioned O'brien is convinced.
The planting of species that store more carbohydrates can be favored to boost the forests'resistance to the drier climates predicted by the climate change models.
The findings have been published today 27 june in IOP Publishing's journal Environmental Research Letters. The large-scale acquisition of land by foreign governments and business--more commonly known as land grabbing--is a contentious issue particularly in Africa where a large number of deals have taken place in regions facing food security problems and malnutrition.
Check labels to use a product that is approved by the Environmental protection agency as an added measure of safety says Layden.
whether organic farms are home to more species than their conventional neighbors. The team used uniform methods across Europe to capture data
#Win-win-win solution for biofuel, climate, and biodiversityfossil fuel emissions release billions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere each year
which is changing the climate and threatening the sustainability of life on planet Earth. In Brazil the demand for alternative energy sources has led to an increase in biofuel crops.
A new News and Views paper in Nature Climate Change co-authored by Woods Hole Research center scientists Marcia Macedo
which would help slow climate change. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by Woods Hole Research center.
#Vegetarian diets produce fewer greenhouse gases and increase longevity, say new studiesconsuming a plant-based diet results in a more sustainable environment
therefore be a feasible and effective tool for climate change mitigation and public health improvements the study concluded.
The takeaway message is that relatively small reductions in the consumption of animal products result in non-trivial environmental benefits
To our knowledge no studies have used yet a single non-simulated data set to independently assess the climate change mitigation potential and actual health outcomes for the same dietary patterns said Joan Sabate MD
The accompanying article makes the case for returning to a large-scale practice of plant-based diets in light of the substantial and detrimental environmental impacts caused by the current trend of eating diets rich in animal products.
and compare the environmental impacts of producing foods consumed by vegetarians and non-vegetarians. Sabate noted that the results emphasize the need to reassess people's nutritional practices in light of environmental challenges and worldwide population growth.
Throughout history forced either by necessity or choice large segments of the world's population have thrived on plant-based diets Sabate said.
The School of Public health at Loma Linda University has a keen interest in studying environmental nutrition
Mathematically modeling species dispersaldispersal is an ecological process involving the movement of an organism or multiple organisms away from their birth site to another location
An important topic in ecology and evolutionary biology dispersal can either be directed random or. Random movement as the name indicates describes dispersal patterns that are unbiased
and respond to local environmental cues by moving directionally. Dispersal is dependent on a variety of factors such as climate food
and predators and is biased often. Fitness-dependent dispersal is a type of biased dispersal; the fitness of a species is given by its per capita growth rate.
In ecology ideal free distribution refers to the way in which organisms distribute themselves among patches proportional to the amount of resources available in each patch.
#New study quantifies the effects of climate change in Europeif no further action is taken and global temperature increases by 3. 5â°C climate damages in the EU could amount to at least â90 billion a net welfare loss of 1. 8%of its current GDP.
Several weather-related extremes could roughly double their average frequency. As a consequence heat-related deaths could reach about 200000 the cost of river flood damages could exceed â0 billion and 8000 km2 of forest could burn in southern Europe.
The number of people affected by droughts could increase by a factor of seven and coastal damage due to sea-level rise could more than triple.
These economic assessments are based on scenarios where the climate expected by the end of the century (2080s) occurs in the current population and economic landscape.
which has analysed the impacts of climate change in 9 different sectors: agriculture river floods coasts tourism energy droughts forest fires transport infrastructure and human health.
The report also includes a pilot study on habitat suitability of forest tree species. Connie Hedegaard European Commissioner for Climate Action said:
No action is clearly the most expensive solution of all. Why pay for the damages when we can invest in reducing our climate impacts
and becoming a competitive low-carbon economy? Taking action and taking a decision on the 2030 climate and energy framework in October will bring us just there
and make Europe ready for the fight against climate change. Expected biophysical impacts (such as agriculture yields river floods transport infrastructure losses) have been integrated into an economic model
in order to assess the implications in terms of household welfare. Premature mortality accounts for more than half of the overall welfare losses (â20 billion) followed by impacts on coasts (â2 billion) and agriculture (â8 billion.
The results also confirm the geographically unbalanced distribution of climate change related damages. For the purpose of this study the European union is divided into 5 regions.
What the study identifies as southern Europe and Central europe south (see background for details) would bear most of the burden(-70)
In this case impacts of climate change would reduce by â0 billion a 30%decrease. In addition some significant biophysical impacts would be reduced substantially:
Firstly there would be reduced a risk of fundamental impacts due to extremes and abrupt climate change.
The study simulated this for the impacts of river floods and results show that they could multiply tenfold.
And because of the country's climate and geography irrigation is now widespread burdening rivers and groundwater supplies.
Our analysis provides a framework for understanding how such policies would benefit China's water use in the future said study co-author Denise Mauzerall professor of environmental engineering and international affairs.
Overall China may want to consider a targeted investment in agricultural research and development said lead author Carole Dalin a Princeton university Ph d. student studying environmental engineering.
but rainfall is limited and stores of underground water are diminishing. To fulfill high production demands water is drawn from underground reservoirs (aquifers) in the northern provinces
Our provincial-scale domestic analysis of the country's virtual water trade is key to guiding such policy planning said Dalin who is a former Princeton Environmental Institute Science Technology and Environmental Policy fellow.
--which also includes Ignacio Rodriguez-Iturbe the James S. Mcdonnell Distinguished University Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering
The researchers combined this information with water use across provinces--from both rainfall and irrigation sources--and determined how much water was transferred between provinces through food trade.
These numbers indicate that such provinces see little rainfall during the growing season and rely heavily on sometimes nonrenewable water resources such as groundwater.
and their exports lead to large national water savings for both rainfall and irrigation water.
#Restricting competitors could help threatened species cope with climate changethreatened animal species could cope better with the effects of climate change
The Durham team studied the impacts of climate on the Alpine Chamois a species of mountain goat
They say their research published in the journal Global Change Biology provides a valuable insight into how managing the interaction of different species could influence changes in animal distributions predicted under climate change.
To their surprise they discovered that competition with sheep had a far greater effect on Chamois than the predicted effects of future climate change.
As the global climate warms many animals are moving to higher latitudes and altitudes where it is cooler.
Many mammals in mountain environments also respond to daily changes in temperature by moving to different altitudes following their preferred temperature range
Species might be squeezed in future due to a combination of climate change and competition with new species expanding into their current habitat.
Our finding offers an intriguing new possibility to help some threatened species cope with climate change by potentially restricting the expansion of competitors in some situations.
We often think of climate as the major determinant of where animals live. However this study shows that the effects of species interactions could be more important than the predicted impacts of climate change.
The study funded by The Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) also revealed that Chamois can alter their behaviour in the face of warmer temperatures seeking shelter during hot periods rather than moving to higher altitudes.
The researchers said that an ability to adjust their behaviours could make some species more adaptable to climate change than previously thought.
However they added that a better understanding of the costs of these behaviours was required. Story Source:
With funding from the Research Council of Norway's programme Climate Change and Impacts in Norway (NORKLIMA) researchers studied the processes scope and consequences of the destruction.
They also studied the events in a context of climate change in North Norway and across the rest of the North Calotte region.
Changing vegetationthe researchers have studied also the impact of these moth invasions on the northern birch forest ecosystem.
and less from reindeer Insect outbreaks mean browner sub-arcticseveral studies in recent years have pointed to the greening of the Arctic due to a warming climate.
This phenomenon can reduce temperatures in heat waves by as much as 2 °C as researchers have demonstrated in a recent study.
However ploughed fields can have a negative effect on the local climate during a heat wave.
This effect was addressed in a recent study conducted by researchers at ETH Zurich led by Edouard Davin senior lecturer at the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science and Sonia Seneviratne professor of land-climate dynamics
In the event of a heat wave such as the one in Europe in 2003 unploughed farm fields could reduce the local temperature by as much as 2 °C. Regional effectthe hotter it becomes the greater the albedo effect and the resulting temperature reduction.
Cropland albedo management has more effect during heat waves because there is almost no clouds during these events
and more radiation can be reflected back into space says first author Edouard Davin. However this effect is only short term and local--perhaps at the most regional but never trans-regional.
and releases it only slowly--this long process of evaporation also helps reduce the air temperature during a heat wave.
in order to mitigate the local effects of climate change--for example on extremely hot days in summer.
It is important that cropland albedo management can dampen heat waves because these events although rare by definition have a large impact on humans
and ecosystems Seneviratne explains. Even though the rise in average global temperatures has stagnated in recent years there has been an increase in extreme heat events over land areas.
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