Young aspen trees in Yellowstone are doing something they have not done in almost 100 years. Rather than sprouting and being eaten back to nubs by elk and bison, they're actually growing into tall, adult forest trees rising up towards the canopy.



This matters more than it might seem, because it shows what happens when a missing piece of an ecosystem returns.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-yellowstone-aspens-and-elk">Yellowstone, aspens, and elk</h2>



In the 1920s, people <a href="https://www.yellowstone.org/wolf-project/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">eliminated wolves in Yellowstone</a>. At the time, with limited scientific knowledge, managers believed it was the right thing to do.



<a href="https://www.earth.com/news/from-wolves-to-dogs-did-domestication-begin-without-human-help/">Without wolves</a>, elk herds grew very large. Elk love to eat aspen shoots - the tender young growth is highly palatable to them.



For roughly 70 years, elk browsed aspen sprouts down to stub height, and the trees couldn't grow. 



If you had walked through Yellowstone in the 1980s, you would have seen many tiny aspen shoots covering the ground, but almost no young trees gaining height. 



The forest's regeneration was stalled. Old trees died, and no new ones replaced them.



In 1995 and 1996, park managers reintroduced wolves into the <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/yellowstone-supervolcano-eruption-study-sparks-new-debate-on-where-and-when-it-will-erupt/">Yellowstone Park ecosystem</a>. Scientists hoped and wondered whether this would change anything for the trees.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-why-aspen-matter-to-yellowstone">Why aspen matter to Yellowstone</h2>



Aspen groves provide habitat for many species. Birds nest in them. Beavers eat the bark and use the wood for dams. Butterflies and moths lay eggs on the leaves. 



Their canopy admits enough light for wildflowers and shrubs to grow beneath. When it rains, aspen groves hold water in the soil better than some other forest types.



In short, when aspen return, dozens of other species benefit. More trees support more insects, which in turn support more birds, enriching the ecosystem.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-checking-the-trees-three-decades-later">Checking the trees three decades later</h2>



<a href="https://fwcs.oregonstate.edu/users/luke-painter" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Luke Painter</a>, an ecologist at <a href="https://oregonstate.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Oregon State University</a>, sought clear answers. His team returned to 87 aspen stands across Yellowstone that scientists had previously surveyed. 



They measured thousands of young trees, looked for bite marks, and counted how many stems were tall enough that elk could no longer reach the tips.



About a third of these stands now have many tall young aspens pushing toward the canopy. 



"About 26 of the 87 aspen stands we examined had large numbers of tall saplings throughout, a remarkable change from the 1990s when surveys found none at all," Painter said.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-why-wolves-matter-to-yellowstone-aspens">Why wolves matter to Yellowstone aspens</h2>



Breaking it all down, the conclusions of this study are pretty simple. 



<a href="https://www.earth.com/news/wolves-move-pups-across-mountains-to-adapt-to-climate-pressure/">Wolves hunt elk</a>. When wolves came back, two things happened. First, elk numbers declined from unusually high levels. Second, elk changed their behavior. They spent less time in the same areas feeding.



With fewer elk and shorter feeding bouts, more aspen shoots survived long enough to exceed the browsing zone - about six to seven feet high. 



Once a sapling reaches that height, elk cannot easily reach the growing tip. The tree continues to grow.



"The reintroduction of large carnivores has initiated a recovery process that had been shut down for decades," Painter explained.



Scientists call this a <a href="https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/trophic-cascades-across-diverse-plant-ecosystems-80060347/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">trophic cascade</a> - when adding or removing one species causes changes that ripple through the whole system.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-some-places-recover-others-don-t">Some places recover, others don't</h2>



Unfortunately, not every aspen stand has recovered yet. Some valleys still have many short, heavily browsed shoots, because it's not only elk eating them anymore. 



<a href="https://www.earth.com/news/yellowstones-iconic-bison-have-merged-into-a-single-herd/">Bison herds have grown</a>, and bison browse on aspen as well. They are strong enough to break young trees. 



"Increasing numbers of bison may be emerging as a new constraint to aspen in some areas," Painter confirmed.



Additionally, winter snow depth varies; droughts stress trees; bears and mountain lions also hunt elk; and hunting outside the park influences elk distribution. 



All of these factors interact, which is why some sites show strong recovery, others show moderate recovery, and a few have changed very little.



The key pattern is that places with many tall saplings experience little browsing, and aspen groves that remain popular eating grounds today stay short. 



This fact is the strongest indication that tree recovery is linked directly to wolf presence, not solely to weather or soil conditions.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-proof-in-the-measurements">Proof in the measurements</h2>



Painter's team did not rely on casual observation. They used the same methods as earlier researchers, measuring the same plots. 



They counted recruitment - when young trees surpass browsing height and begin progressing toward maturity. This measure is crucial. Sprouts are insufficient if they never grow; without recruitment, the forest cannot replace itself.



The results are robust. After being stalled for most of a century, Yellowstone's aspens are increasing in height. In recovering stands today, you will see saplings - six, eight, or ten feet tall - that were not present in the 1990s.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-future-of-yellowstone-s-aspens">The future of Yellowstone's aspens</h2>



"This is a remarkable case of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/giant-viruses-found-in-yellowstones-hot-springs-may-be-near-the-root-of-all-life-on-earth/">ecological restoration</a>," Painter concluded. "Wolf reintroduction is yielding long-term ecological changes contributing to increased biodiversity and habitat diversity."



Trees grow slowly, so even with wolves restored, it will take decades for these young aspens to form a full-grown forest. 



Some areas might never fully recover if bison numbers continue to rise or if the climate becomes too hot and dry.



Thanks to the work of Painter and his team, scientists are now certain that restoring the Yellowstone predator has restarted aspen forest regeneration. Not everywhere and not perfectly, but enough to be measured, creating hope for the future.



The full study was published in the journal <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378112725004499?via%3Dihub" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Forest Ecology and Management</a>.



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Yellowstone's aspen trees are growing again thanks to the reintroduction of wolves

Young aspen trees in Yellowstone are doing something they have not done in almost 100 years. Rather than sprouting and being eaten back to nubs by elk and bison, they're actually growing into tall, adult forest trees rising up towards the canopy. This matters more than it might seem, because it shows what happens when a missing piece of an ecosystem returns. Yellowstone, aspens, and elk In the 1920s, people eliminated wolves in Yellowstone. At the time, with limited scientific knowledge, managers believed it was the right...

Although raindrops, evaporating water, or even air moisture are all potential sources of decentralized clean electricity generation, most of the technologies that take advantage of these widespread sources of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/earth-could-be-powered-entirely-by-renewable-energy/">energy</a> remain at the lab-bench stage. To provide a comprehensive map of these developments and their possible future, a recent study published in the journal <a href="https://www.sciopen.com/article/10.26599/NRE.2023.9120042">Nano Research Energy</a> has surveyed the opportunities and challenges this young field currently faces.



Huge hydroelectric dams, large tidal barrages, or wave-energy converters on the sea surface are some of the first things one thinks of when considering sustainable energy generation. However, these options depend upon heavy, bulky, and above all centralized forms of harvesting energy from water. According to the scientists leading this new study though, there are myriad of other technological pathways that could take advantage of the ubiquitous presence of water on our planet.



“Water is everywhere. It is ambiently available like no other entity. So all this clean energy is just sitting there, unused and waiting for us to take advantage of it,” said study senior author Zuankai Wang, a mechanical engineer at the <a href="https://www.cityu.edu.hk/">City University of Hong Kong</a>. “It makes sense for us to tap into this vast reservoir of energy not just for bulk electricity production, but for a range of applications such as sensors and wearable devices where a micro-scale of energy harvesting is much more appropriate to the use it is being put to.”



Unfortunately, the development of such distributed water-energy technologies remains very much in its infancy, with many of the current concepts for water-energy harvesting techniques suffering from poor durability, scalability, and low energy conversion. “And yet the rest of nature has figured out thousands of different ways to do exactly this. Evolution has basically perfected the process of extracting energy from ambient hydrologic processes in ways that are extremely efficient,” Wang explained.



For instance, the lotus leaf allows droplets of water to roll across its surface with extremely low resistance, the Araucaria leaves cause liquids with varying surface tensions to flow in different directions, while some carnivorous plants (the so-called “nepenthes” or pitcher plants) are able to direct liquid through their surface structure. These natural phenomena inspired scientists to develop superhydrophobic surfaces or “slippery liquid-infused porous surfaces” that can repel liquid extremely efficiently, allowing for constant electrical output from droplets in harsh environments with high humidity, high salt concentrations, and low temperatures.



Besides plants, animals such as electric eels inspired researchers to develop artificial electric organs making use of hydrogel arrays (highly absorbent polymers which don’t dissolve in water) that function like eel membrane components.



Unfortunately, much of the design of such bio-inspired water-driven electricity generators remains at a lab-bench stage, and the devices currently constructed have a very short lifespan. Further theoretical and experimental research is needed to better understand the underlying structures of water-driven electricity generation in order to manage to efficiently construct durable and scalable bionics that could mimic nature’s capacities.



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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Harvesting electricity with nature-inspired techniques

Although raindrops, evaporating water, or even air moisture are all...

The end-Permian <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/the-sixth-mass-extinction-is-currently-in-progress/">mass extinction</a> from 250 million years ago is the most severe of the five mass extinctions our planet faced, decimating over 80 percent of marine and terrestrial plant and animal species. This catastrophic loss of biodiversity was triggered by the emplacement of a continental-scale volcanic eruption covering much of modern-day Siberia, which released massive amounts of carbon from the Earth’s interior into the atmosphere, generating a devastating global warming event that led to the collapse of the ozone layer.



Now, an international team of scientists has discovered that pollen preserved in rocks dating from that period contained compounds that function like sunscreen and were produced by plants to protect them from harmful ultraviolet radiation (UV-B). These findings suggest that a pulse of UV-B may have played an important role in the end-Permian mass extinction.



“Plants require sunlight for photosynthesis but need to protect themselves and particularly their pollen against the harmful effects of UV-B radiation. To do so, plants load the outer walls of pollen grains with compounds that function like sunscreen to protect the vulnerable cells to ensure successful reproduction,” explained Barry Lomax, a professor of Plant Paleobiology at the <a href="https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/">University of Nottingham</a>. &nbsp;



“We have developed a method to detect these phenolic compounds in fossil pollen grains (Alisporites-type) recovered from southern Tibet and detected much higher concentrations in those grains that were produced during the end-Permian mass extinction and peak phase of volcanic activity,” added Liu Feng, a paleontologist at the <a href="http://english.nigpas.cas.cn/">Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology</a>.



The researchers discovered an increase in UV-B-absorbing compounds (UACs)&nbsp;which coincided with a massive rise in mercury concentration and a decrease in carbon isotopes in the latest Permian deposits, suggesting a close temporal link between large-scale volcanic eruptions, worldwide carbon- and mercury-cycle perturbations, and disruptions of the ozone layer. Thus, elevated UV-B levels most likely exerted far-reaching and long-lasting impacts on the entire planet, reducing plant biomass and terrestrial carbon storage and exacerbating global warming. Moreover, increased concentrations of phenolic compounds made plant tissue harder to digest, making an already hostile environment even more challenging for herbivores.



“Volcanism on such a cataclysmic scale influences all aspects of the Earth system, from direct chemical changes in the atmosphere, through changes in carbon sequestration rates, to reducing the volume of nutritious food sources available for animals,” concluded Wes Fraser, an expert in Organic Geochemistry at <a href="https://www.brookes.ac.uk/">Oxford Brookes University</a>.



The study is published in the journal <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abo6102">Science Advances</a>.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



—



By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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UV radiation played a role in Earth's largest mass extinction

The end-Permian mass extinction from 250 million years ago is...

It is accepted that birds evolved from <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/past-climate-change-drove-the-rapid-evolution-of-reptiles/">reptiles</a>, and particularly from small, carnivorous theropod dinosaurs, and that this process did not take place in one burst of evolution. Rather, the huge morphological changes happened in steps, over tens of millions of years, with the typical bird features evolving at different rates, for distinct purposes, and ending up giving the characteristic modern bird body plan. However, paleontologists still wonder how it was that all these dramatic transformations took place.&nbsp;



A new bird fossil, found in the Jiufotang Formation of Liaoning Province in China, has now been analyzed by paleontologists from the <a href="https://english.cas.cn/">Chinese Academy of Sciences</a> in Beijing, and has shown to be a bizarre mixture of dinosaur and bird features. It is dated at around 120 million years and combines a typical bird body with a reptilian skull that is similar in morphology to the skull of Tyranosaurus rex. This finding supports the idea that evolutionary changes in morphology did not take place at the same rate in all body structures during early bird diversification.&nbsp;



“The Cretaceous period is a critical time interval that encompasses explosive diversifications of terrestrial vertebrates, particularly the period when the earliest-branching birds, after divergence from their theropod ancestors, evolved the characteristic avian bauplan that led eventually to their global radiation,” said Dr. WANG Min, a researcher with the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology and the Center for Excellence in Life and Paleoenvironment at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.



Named Cratonavis zhui, this new species is positioned on the avian evolutionary tree, somewhere between the more reptile-like, long-tailed&nbsp;Archaeopteryx&nbsp;and the Ornithothoraces (which include modern birds and their closest ancestors). Its features include wings, feathers, claws on the wings, conical teeth, and the absence of a long, bony tail. In addition, the fossil bird has unusually elongated scapulae and first metatarsal bones, features that are, so far, unique to this species alone.



The researchers used high-resolution computed tomography (CT)-scanning to analyze the fossilized bones, and then they “removed” these, digitally, from their rocky tomb, repositioned them and reconstructed the original shape of the post-cranial skeleton and skull. They found that, while the skeleton was typically bird-like, the skull retained small, conical teeth, along with the feature known as akinesis, which is characteristic of dinosaurs and other reptiles, but not of modern birds.&nbsp;



“The primitive cranial features speak to the fact that most Cretaceous birds, such as&nbsp;Cratonavis,&nbsp;could not move their upper bill independently with respect to the braincase and lower jaw, a functional innovation widely distributed among living birds that contributes to their enormous ecological diversity,” said Dr. LI Zhiheng, a lead author of the study.



As for the bizarre scapula and first metatarsal bone in Cratonavis, Dr. WANG Min, a lead and corresponding author of this study, said: “The scapula is functionally vital to avian flight, and it conveys stability and flexibility. We trace changes of the scapula across the theropod-bird transition, and posit that the elongate scapula could augment the mechanical advantage of muscle for humerus retraction/rotation, which compensates for the overall underdeveloped flight apparatus in this early bird, and these differences represent morphological experimentation in volant behaviour, early in bird diversification.”



In their report, published in&nbsp;<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41559-022-01921-w">Nature Ecology &amp; Evolution</a>, the paleontologists conclude that the elongated first metatarsals in the fossil bird’s feet were subjected to selection pressure during the dinosaur-bird transition, and ended up becoming shorter. They then lost their evolutionary lability (changeability) once they reached their optimal size, less than a quarter of the length of the second metatarsal.&nbsp;



“However, increased evolutionary lability was present among Mesozoic birds and their dinosaur kins, which may have resulted from conflicting demands associated with its direct employment of the hallux [innermost digit of the hind foot] in locomotion and feeding,” said co-author Dr. Thomas Stidham. For&nbsp;Cratonavis, such an elongated hallux may have been advantageous while hunting for prey.



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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Puzzling fossil has the body of a bird, skull of a dinosaur

It is accepted that birds evolved from reptiles, and particularly...

The,Queen,(apis,Mellifera),Marked,With,Dot,And,Bee,Workers

The <a href="https://www.usda.gov/">U.S. Department of Agriculture</a> (USDA) has recently granted a conditional license for a vaccine aiming to protect <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/honey-bees-cannot-fly-straight-after-ingesting-pesticides/">honey bees</a> from American foulbrood disease, an infection caused by the bacterium Paenibacillus larvae that weakens and kills honey bee colonies and currently has no treatment. This vaccine – developed by the U.S. biotech company <a href="https://www.dalan.com/">Dalan Animal Health</a> – raises hopes for a new and powerful weapon against a disease that routinely ravage colonies that are highly important for food pollination.



“Our vaccine is a breakthrough in protecting honey bees,” said Annette Kleiser, the chief executive of Dalan. “We are ready to change how we care for insects, impacting food production on a global scale.”



In parts of the U.S., the foulbrood disease has been found in over a quarter of honey bee hives. Since there is no cure for this disease available yet, beekeepers usually destroy and burn infected colonies and administer antibiotics to stop further spread.



“It’s something that beekeepers can easily recognize because it reduces the larvae to this brown goo that has a rancid stink to it,” explained Keith Delaplane, an entomologist at the <a href="https://www.uga.edu/">University of Georgia</a> who worked together with Dalan for the vaccine’s development.



This groundbreaking vaccine works by incorporating some of the bacteria into the royal jelly fed by worker bees to the queen. After ingesting the vaccine-laced jelly, the queen will gain some of the vaccine in its ovaries and the developing bee larvae will have immunity to foulbrood as they hatch.



“In a perfect scenario, the queens could be fed a cocktail within a queen candy – the soft, pasty sugar that queen bees eat while in transit. Queen breeders could advertise ‘fully vaccinated queens,” Delapane said.



Since the U.S. is highly dependent upon managed honey bee colonies to assist food pollination – with bee hives frequently transported around the country to help pollinating a variety of crops, ranging from almonds to blueberries – the development of this vaccine is a major step forward for boosting agricultural production. Scientists hope that this medical breakthrough could be used to create vaccines for other bee-related diseases, such as the European strain of foulbrood.



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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World’s first honeybee vaccine approved by the USDA

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has recently granted a...

While most mammals are covered in fur, some have significantly less body <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/human-body-parts-hair/">hair</a> - including rhinos, elephants, naked mole rats, dolphins, and humans. Until recently, the reasons for this have remained a mystery. To shed more light on this issue, a research team led by the <a href="https://www.utah.edu/">University of Utah</a> and the <a href="https://www.pitt.edu/">University of Pittsburgh</a> has now compared the genetic codes of 62 animal species.&nbsp;



The analysis revealed that a set of genes and regulatory regions of the genome which seem to be essential for producing hair have been disabled during evolution in several mammalian species, particularly in those that evolved at faster rates.&nbsp;



“We have taken the creative approach of using biological diversity to learn about our own genetics,” said study senior author Nathan Clark, a geneticist at the University of Utah. “This is helping us to pinpoint regions of our genome that contribute to something important to us.”



According to the scientists, being hairless has its own evolutionary benefits. For instance, without dense hair, elephants cool off more easily in hotter climates and walruses glide effortlessly in water. 



However, despite these various reasons, the analysis of 19,149 genes and 343,598 regulatory regions that were conserved across dozens of mammalian species suggested that hairless mammals seem to have accumulated mutations in many of the same genes, including those that code for keratin and other elements that facilitate hair growth. In addition, regulatory regions of the genome – which rather than coding directly for structures that produce hair, influence the process indirectly, by guiding when and where specific genes are activated - appear equally important.&nbsp;



Another major finding of the study was that hairless mammals evolved at faster rates than their hairy counterparts. “As animals are under evolutionary pressure to lose hair, the genes encoding hair become less important. That’s why they speed up the rate of genetic changes that are permitted by natural selection. Some genetic changes might be responsible for loss of hair. Others could be collateral damage after hair stops growing,” Clark explained.



By answering fundamental questions about the mechanisms shaping this rather rare feature in mammals, the scientists hope to find new ways to recover hair after balding or chemotherapy, as well as in people with disorders that cause hair loss.



The study is published in the journal <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.76911">eLife</a>.&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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Hairless mammals evolved at a faster pace

While most mammals are covered in fur, some have significantly...

The role of the gut <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/dog-microbiomes-around-the-world-are-functionally-similar/">microbiome</a> in respiratory viral infections in general, and in COVID-19 patients, in particular, is only just beginning to be understood. Previous reports have shown that COVID-19 is often accompanied by gastrointestinal symptoms and that persistent microbiome changes are found in people with long-term COVID-19. Furthermore, investigations have shown that all COVID-19 patients manifest differences in gut bacterial populations when compared to healthy controls, and that infected patients treated with broad-spectrum antibiotics while in hospital have an increased risk of developing multi-drug resistant secondary infections and of dying from septic shock.



Despite these earlier findings, the causal direction of the relationship between disrupted gut microbiome and infection by coronavirus has remained unclear. Does coronavirus infection result in a disrupted gut microbiome, or does an already weakened or dysfunctional gut microbiome make the body more vulnerable to infection by the virus?



A recent study, led by researchers from <a href="https://med.nyu.edu/our-community/about-us">NYU Grossman School of Medicine</a>, has now set out to elucidate this relationship. Initially, the researchers tested the changes in gut microbes found in laboratory mice that had been infected with SARS-CoV-2, and found that the diversity of different bacterial species in the gut decreased dramatically within the first few days of infection. Some families of important bacteria disappeared from the gut, while other families proliferated. These results led the researchers to suspect that the virus would also disrupt the microbiome in human patients.&nbsp;



They then investigated changes to gut microbes in 96 men and women who were hospitalized with COVID-19 in 2020, in New York City and in New Haven, Conn. The researchers analyzed the microbe communities present in stool samples taken throughout each patient’s hospital stay.&nbsp;



The results, published in the journal <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-33395-6">Nature Communications</a>, showed that the majority of patients had low gut microbiome diversity, as was found in the experimental mice, with around a quarter of the patients showing a microbiome dominated by a single type of bacteria. At the same time, populations of several microbes known to include antibiotic-resistant species increased, possibly due to widespread antibiotic use early in the pandemic. Antibiotics kill off species that are susceptible to the drugs but leave, in their place, different species that are resistant to the drugs.&nbsp;



These antibiotic-resistant bacteria found in the gut were also observed to have migrated into the bloodstream in 20 percent of patients. In the bloodstream, they cause infections that can be life-threatening to patients. The study authors note that further research is needed to uncover why this group was at higher risk for a secondary infection while other patients remained protected.&nbsp;



“Our findings suggest that coronavirus infection directly interferes with the healthy balance of microbes in the gut, further endangering patients in the process,” says study co-senior author and microbiologist Dr. Ken Cadwell. “Now that we have uncovered the source of this bacterial imbalance, physicians can better identify those coronavirus patients most at risk of a secondary bloodstream infection."



Under normal circumstances, microbes are not able to migrate between the gut and the bloodstream unless the intestinal barrier is damaged. In fact, the researchers found gut epithelial cell alterations in the mice infected with SARS-CoV-2, implying that the virus in some way also changes the permeability of the intestine lining.&nbsp; In previous research, the influenza virus was also shown to disrupt the intestinal barrier in mice by damaging the gut microbiota.&nbsp;



In the current study, the patients who were shown to have a microbiome dominated by one type of bacteria often suffered the migration of this drug-resistant species from the gut into the blood, indicating some compromise to the intestinal barrier. This caused a secondary infection in these patients that proved fatal, in some instances.&nbsp;



“Our results highlight how the gut microbiome and different parts of the body’s immune system are closely interconnected,” says study senior author Dr. Jonas Schluter. “An infection in one can lead to major disruptions in the other.” Schluter cautions that since the patients received different kinds of treatments for their illness, the investigation could not entirely account for all factors that may have contributed to the disruption of their microbiome and worsen their disease.&nbsp;



Taken together, these research findings support a scenario in which gut-to-blood migration of microorganisms occurs in COVID-19 patients due to the virus causing disruption to the normal gut microbiome. This migration leads to bloodstream infections that can be dangerous complications of the disease. According to Schluter, the study team next plans to examine why certain microbial species are more likely to escape the gut during COVID-19. The researchers say they also intend to explore how different microbes interact, which may contribute to this migration into the bloodstream. &nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

COVID disrupts gut health, increasing risk of other infections

The role of the gut microbiome in respiratory viral infections...

Drying soils will likely host an increasing number of pathogenic <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/plants-shed-their-flowers-quickly-for-protection-from-microbes/">microbes</a> which pose a threat to public health, according to a new study. The research will be presented at the 107th Annual Meeting of the <a href="https://www.esa.org/">Ecological Society of America</a>.



Previous studies have shown that soil microbes are vulnerable to environmental degradation and climate change. Soil bacterial communities are crucial for fertile soils and plant growth, and the expected loss of microbial diversity in drying soils could have severe consequences when it comes to global food security.



The new research reveals that soil-borne pathogens are resilient to stressful environmental conditions. This means that disease-causing bacteria are more likely than non-pathogenic microbes to survive the persistent droughts that are expected to coincide with climate change and global warming.&nbsp;



A team of researchers at New Mexico State University led by Professor Adriana Romero-Olivares investigated the complex relationships between global change and soil fungi. The study was focused on soil fungal communities in the southwestern United States.



In collaboration with experts at ETH Zürich and the U.S. Geological Survey, the researchers extracted fungal DNA from soils to compare the effects of local environmental conditions on microbial communities.



The results suggest that spore-producing fungi will thrive and become more prevalent in increasingly dry soils. Pathogenic fungi release spores that spread easily through airborne dispersal, and these species may be able to endure dust storms and droughts that non-pathogenic species are unable to tolerate, explained the study authors.



“It’s not only about the fungi that we know are pathogenic, but also about the fungi that have the potential to become pathogenic. We have no idea if global climate change may trigger pathogenicity and we really need to start looking into that to prevent future pandemics,” said Romero-Olivares.



The research will be used to inform policy makers on the public health threat potential that climate change has on soil fungal communities.



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Drying soils pose a major threat to public health

Drying soils will likely host an increasing number of pathogenic...

As glaciers melt and lose mass, they will contribute to sea-level rise. It is already estimated that meltwater from all glacial land ice (excluding the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets) has contributed 21 percent of the sea-level rise recorded between 2000 and 2019. In addition, melting glaciers will change available water resources for around 1.9 billion people, altering annual and seasonal runoff for personal use and agriculture, and contributing to water insecurity.&nbsp;



Melting glaciers will also increase the frequency and magnitude of glacier-related hazards, such as landslides and outburst floods, over the next century. For all these reasons, it is critical to predict and understand the magnitude, spatial pattern, and timing of glacier mass loss.



In a new study that represents “a substantial step forward in predictive modeling”&nbsp;of glacier response to climate change, a team of international researchers has developed a model predicting the fate of all 215,547 of the world’s mountain glaciers (excluding those on the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets) under various different warming scenarios. Their findings emphasize that, even if warming is limited to the target 1.5oC, all glaciers will be under threat by the end of 2100.



The study uses new and more detailed data sets on glacier mass balance and rates of ablation, and represents glacier dynamics with a flowline model. The researchers also consider important physical processes that have not been incorporated in previous models, and provide model predictions for global warming at 1.5oC, 2oC, 3oC and 4oC above pre-industrial levels, all the way to the year 2100. In a related perspective of the research, a commentator referred to this model as the “most comprehensive so far.”



The findings, published in the journal <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.abo1324">Science</a>, predict that, globally, glaciers will lose between 26 percent (+1.5°C) and 41 percent (+4°C) of their mass by 2100, relative to a 2015 baseline. This mass loss would increase mean sea level by between 90 (+1.5°C) and 154 (+4°C) mm SLE, representing a 71 percent increase between the +1.5°C and +4°C scenarios.



The researchers report that, even in the most optimistic scenario of limiting global warming to 1.5 oC above pre-industrial levels, their model predicts that nearly 60 percent of the world’s glaciers will be lost by 2100. Within 2°C, the agreed warming limit of the Paris Agreement, about 70 percent of the smaller glaciers and 20 percent of the larger ones will melt completely. Considering that estimates from COP26 predict a global mean temperature increase of around 2.7°C by 2100, even the very largest glaciers in the Polar Regions will be under threat.&nbsp;



And the consequences do not stop at 2100. Even if temperature is stabilized at any level, the glaciers that remain will continue to lose mass beyond the model’s 2100 end point. These dire predictions highlight the need to act now in order to prevent substantial glacier loss.



“Every increase in temperature has significant consequences with respect to glacier contribution to sea level rise, the loss of glaciers around the world, and changes to hydrology, ecology, and natural hazards," wrote the study authors, led by David Rounce of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University and the Geophysical Institute at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.



In&nbsp;a related Perspective (also published in Science), Guðfinna Aðalgeirsdóttir and Timothy James say it is important to frame these findings in a positive light in order to motivate the public to support climate change policies. They say the authors of this study, “. . . while issuing a stark warning about the consequences of insufficient action, achieve this framing with an important message: Although it is too late to avoid losing many glaciers, any effort to limit global mean temperature rise will have a direct effect on reducing how many glaciers will be lost.”



The new model reveals a strong linear relationship between global mean temperature increase and glacier mass loss, meaning that, no matter how small the increase in global mean temperature, it will lead to increased glacier loss and added sea-level rise. And if temperatures were to increase by +2.7°C, as predicted at COP26, Earth will likely experience a near-complete deglaciation of entire mid-latitude regions by 2100, including Central Europe, Western Canada and United States, and New Zealand, which will add more to sea-level rise than is currently estimated.



In conclusion, the researchers stress the urgency of establishing more ambitious climate pledges to preserve the glaciers in the mountainous regions of the world. It may be too late to prevent the loss of many glaciers, but because of the linear relationship between temperature rise and ice mass loss, any action that is taken to limit warming will have a direct effect on reducing the number of glaciers lost.



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Half of the world’s glaciers will melt by 2100

As glaciers melt and lose mass, they will contribute to...

A study funded by the National Institutes of Health has identified two specific air pollutants that cause asthma attacks in urban <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/children-connect-with-the-environment-through-story-writing/">children</a>. The experts report that moderate levels of ozone and fine particulate matter are linked to asthma attacks among adolescents who live in low-income urban areas.



The research was focused on non-viral asthma attacks that are not caused by respiratory viruses. The team examined the relationship between air pollutant levels and non-viral asthma attacks among more than 200 children who lived in low-income neighborhoods in one of nine U.S. cities.&nbsp;



The researchers found that asthma attacks had a non-viral cause in nearly 30 percent of the urban children. This rate is two to three times higher than that of children who do not live in a city, according to previous evidence.&nbsp;



“The strong association this study demonstrates between specific air pollutants among children in impoverished urban communities and non-viral asthma attacks further augments the evidence that reducing air pollution would improve human health,” said Dr. Hugh Auchincloss, director of the <a href="https://www.niaid.nih.gov/">National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases</a> (NIAID).&nbsp;



The study also revealed that exposure to ozone and fine particulate matter is associated with molecular changes in the children’s airways during non-viral asthma attacks. These molecular changes could possibly be the underlying cause of the exacerbations.



"We identified that increased air quality index values, driven predominantly by increased PM2·5 and O3 concentrations, were significantly associated with asthma exacerbations and decreases in pulmonary function that occurred in the absence of a provoking viral infection," wrote the study authors.&nbsp;



"Moreover, individual pollutants were significantly associated with altered gene expression in coordinated inflammatory pathways, including PM2·5 with increased epithelial induction of tissue kallikreins, mucus hypersecretion, and barrier functions and O3 with increased type-2 inflammation."



"Our findings suggest that air pollution is an important independent risk factor for asthma exacerbations in children living in urban areas and is potentially linked to exacerbations through specific inflammatory pathways in the airway. Further investigation of these potential mechanistic pathways could inform asthma prevention and management approaches."



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanplh/article/PIIS2542-5196(22)00302-3/fulltext">The Lancet Planetary Health</a>.



Image Credit: UN Photo/Kibae Park



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Specific air pollutants linked to asthma attacks in urban children

A study funded by the National Institutes of Health has...

Bladderwrack (Fucus vesiculosus)&nbsp;is a species of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/record-breaking-macroalgae-blooms/">macroalgae</a> common to the Baltic Sea that is known to act as an important carbon sink, sequestering a major amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide. However, by measuring the fluxes of greenhouse gases between surface waters and the atmosphere over several seasons, a team of researchers led by the <a href="https://www.su.se/stockholm-university-baltic-sea-centre/infrastructure/ask%C3%B6-laboratory">Askö Laboratory</a> in Sweden has found that these algae also emit significant amounts of methane – a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 - and thus potentially offset the uptake of atmospheric CO2.&nbsp;



“It was a bit surprising that methane was emitted from the bladderwrack, since this algae grows on hard substrates and not on soft sediments, where methane is produced normally,” said study co-author Christoph Humborg, the scientific director of the <a href="https://www.su.se/stockholm-university-baltic-sea-centre/infrastructure/ask%C3%B6-laboratory">Stockholm University Baltic Sea Center</a>. “But what we found was that these algae form pockets of sediment where methane forming microorganisms, archaea, could be detected. We found these archaea also on floating filamentous algae and organic matter debris associated with dense stands of bladderwrack.”



By&nbsp;continuously measuring greenhouse gas fluxes between the water surface and atmosphere outside the Askö Laboratory in Trosa during an entire year, the scientists confirmed that mixed vegetation and bladderwrack forests in coastal areas do take up significant amounts of atmospheric CO2. However, this uptake was offset by methane fluxes from the water to the atmosphere.



“Caring for and restoring macroalgae habitats could still be important from a climate perspective. Our study shows that these environments are net carbon sinks, just not as large as has sometimes been suggested,” Humborg explained.



According to the researchers, it is important to clarify whether methane production in the macroalgae habitats is influenced by their health status. “Our measurements were done in situ in the Baltic Sea, which is affected by eutrophication. A less eutrophic ecosystem with less organic matter accumulation and less filamentous algae growth could likely produce less methane. If so, taking measures to help the Baltic Sea recover from eutrophication would substantially improve the blue carbon potential of these habitats and contribute to mitigating climate change,” he concluded.



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-35673-9">Nature Communications</a>.



Image Credit: Stockholm University Baltic Sea Centre



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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Methane emissions offset carbon uptake by macroalgae

Bladderwrack (Fucus vesiculosus)&nbsp;is a species of macroalgae common to the...

Rats have been introduced to many offshore islands in the past, mostly arriving by accident aboard visiting ships. They can cause devastation to the indigenous wildlife of these islands, particularly if the native species include ground-nesting birds. This has led to a call for rat eradication programs on many islands, in order to save wildlife from the deleterious impacts of these introduced <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/why-rodent-borne-diseases-spill-over-into-humans/">rodents</a>.&nbsp;



A study led by researchers at <a href="https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/">Lancaster University</a> has now identified an unexpected way in which invasive rats on tropical islands have affected the lives of fish inhabiting the reefs around the islands. This is an unusual instance where the presence of terrestrial rats leads to a change in the behavior of species in an entirely different biome. It reveals how species in different biomes are linked, despite the fact that they will never meet one another.



The study, which also involved researchers from Lakehead University in Canada,&nbsp;compared the territorial behavior of jewel damselfish (Plectroglyphidodon lacrymatus) on reefs around five rat-infested and five rat-free islands in a remote archipelago in the Indian Ocean. These small reef fish are highly territorial and readily chase away other fish that enter their territory. They “cultivate” patches of algae between the branches of corals within a territory, and mostly direct their aggression towards intruders that are also herbivorous and in search of algal turf for food.&nbsp;



Previous research has shown that the damselfish around rat-free islands benefit from the nutrients that leach from the guano of seabirds breeding and roosting on the islands. These seabirds, including mostly terns and noddies, forage at sea and return to their nests on the islands. They produce nutrient-rich guano that enters the waters surrounding the islands and provides a sort of fertilizer. Around the rat-free islands, algal productivity and damselfish growth and body sizes are higher than they are in the waters around rat-infested islands.&nbsp;



The black rats (Rattus rattus) are thought to have been introduced to the archipelago in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, but are not present on all the islands. This provided the researchers with a natural experiment in which they could assess the impacts of the rats by comparing the behavior of damselfish around rat-infested and rat-free islands.&nbsp;



The rats feed on the eggs and chicks of the resident seabirds, causing significant decreases in bird population numbers. The researchers recorded an average of 1,243 birds per ha on rat-free islands, and 1.6 birds per ha on rat-infested islands, which equates to a seabird density that is 720 times smaller where rats are present. As a result, there is less guano on rat-infested islands, and less nutrient-enrichment in the surrounding waters.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The findings of the current study, published in <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41559-022-01931-8">Nature Ecology and Evolution</a>, show that damselfish on reefs around rat-infested islands defend larger territories (average 0.62m² compared with 0.48m² around rat-free islands), presumably because the algae receives less nutrient-enrichment and is less productive where the seabird populations have been decimated; the damselfish therefore need a larger “farm” area to fulfil their needs.



In addition, while damselfish aggressively defended their small territories and algal turf patches around rat-free islands, the fish on reefs around rat-infested islands were far less likely to behave aggressively towards other fish that entered their territory. The researchers hypothesize that the algal food in waters around rat-infested islands was simply not nutritious or productive enough to make it worth defending.&nbsp;



Dr. Rachel Gunn conducted the research as part of her PhD studies at Lancaster University and is now at Tuebingen University, Germany.&nbsp;



"Jewel damselfish around rat-free islands aggressively defend their turf because the higher enriched nutrient content means they get ‘more for their money,’ and this makes it worth the energy cost needed to defend," said Dr. Gunn. "Conversely, the fish around rat-infested islands behave less aggressively. We believe that the presence of rats is lowering the nutritional benefit of the turf to the extent that it is almost not worth fighting for, which is what we are observing with these behavior changes.”&nbsp;



Seabirds are drivers of nutrient cycling in numerous locations around the world, as they forage out in the oceans and return to land to roost and breed. The results of this study reveal that the reduction in nutrient availability, due to the effects of invasive rats on the seabird populations, can also affect the behavior of fish in the shallow waters around tropical islands. It is possible that the reduced nutrient levels could also affect other reef species, and influence the spread of corals, the distribution of reef fish and the genetic traits of damselfish.&nbsp;



“The algal farming of damselfish affects the balance of corals and algae on the reef. Their aggression towards other fish can influence the way those fish move around and use the reef. We do not yet know what the consequence of this behavioral change will be but ecosystems evolve a delicate balance over long time-scales, so any disruption could have knock-on consequences for the wider ecosystem,” said Dr. Gunn.



“Changes in behavior are often the first response of animals to environmental change, and can scale up to affect if, how and when species can live alongside one another," explained Dr. Sally Keith, the principal investigator of the study. "Our research is the first to show that these broader impacts can even be felt across biomes, from terrestrial invaders to marine farmers. It also shows the power of leveraging real-world environmental variation across multiple locations as an approach to understand animal behavior.”



The findings also add evidence in support of rat eradication programs on tropical islands. Rats have been removed successfully from more than 580 islands worldwide, and in many instances resident seabird populations have benefitted. It is clear from this study that the return of seabirds and their guano would be advantageous, not only for the islands’ ecosystems, but also for the nearshore marine ecosystems that receive nutrient enrichment as a consequence of seabird presence. Rat eradication should be conservation priority for these tropical islands.&nbsp;



“We have provided more evidence that invasive rats have a large impact on both terrestrial and marine ecosystems," said Dr. Gunn. "Rat eradication has the potential to have multiple, cross-ecosystem benefits. The removal of invasive rats could restore the territorial behavior of farming damselfish, which could scale up to benefit coral reef community composition and resilience.”



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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Rats on tropical islands change reef fish behavior

Rats have been introduced to many offshore islands in the...

A new study led by <a href="https://www.ncsu.edu/">North Carolina State University</a> has found that Twitter and online new articles could be used effectively to track the timing and location of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/what-is-the-origin-of-californias-latest-invasive-insect/">invasive insect</a> spread in the United States and globally. These findings suggest that such sources are promising for filling gaps when official data are not widely available.



“The idea was to explore if we could use this data to fill in some of the information gaps about pest spread, and ultimately, to support the development of better predictive models of where pest spread is happening, and when to use costly control measures,” said study lead author Laura Tateosian, an associate professor of Geospatial Analytics at NC State. “Even though these are not formal scientific sources, we found that we could clearly see some of the major events that were occurring about two invasive pests in the news, and on Twitter.”



The scientists tracked Tweets and online news articles (published between 2011 and 2021) about two invasive insects: the spotted lanternfly and the tomato leaf miner (Tuta absoluta). The former - first spotted in the U.S. in 2014 – is an insect native to Asia which can damage or even destroy grapes, cherries, hops, certain lumber trees, and other plants. The latter – often nicknamed the “tomato Ebola” – is native to South America, and was first discovered in Spain in 2006 before spreading to Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.



“While some invasive insects have reached their global range, in both of these cases, the pests are actively spreading,” said study co-author Ariel Saffer, a graduate student in Geospatial Analytics at NC State. “We launched this as a proof-of-concept study to see if it would be scientifically reasonable to use these sources to track pest spread. We compared information in places where the insects were known to be present to see if these sources accurately captured existing knowledge.”



The analysis revealed that activity on Twitter and in news stories reflected some of the patterns in official surveys, such as the pests’ seasonal cycles, and major outbreaks. In Pennsylvania – where the spotted lanternfly was first found - news articles uncovered one county not listed in the official records.



“News media and social media have the potential to give you more immediate insight into what’s going on, especially if scientific information on insect spread is not immediately published in scientific literature, or not widely available to other scientists. Also, relying on data from scientific publications can sometimes offer a patchwork coverage of space and time, depending on when that study happened. It can be hard to get aggregated information in continuous time, especially at the global scale, as that information can be managed by multiple agencies,” Saffer concluded.



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compenvurbsys.2022.101922">Computers, Environment and Urban Systems</a>.



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer



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Tweets provide insights on how invasive insects spread

A new study led by North Carolina State University has...

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2E0mn5mTvhQ
</div><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">'Death Star' moon Mimas conceals a 15-million-year-old ocean that scientists never expected.</figcaption></figure>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-hidden-waters-beneath-ancient-craters">Hidden waters beneath ancient craters</h2>



Scientists have made a startling discovery that challenges everything we thought we knew about <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/saturn-moon-mimas-has-remarkably-young-ocean/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Saturn's moon Mimas</a>. Beneath the heavily cratered surface that earned it the nickname "Death Star" lies a global ocean that formed just 5 to 15 million years ago—a remarkably young age by cosmic standards.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-cassini-data-reveals-orbital-secrets">Cassini data reveals orbital secrets</h2>



The discovery, led by Dr. Valéry Lainey of the <a href="https://observatoiredeparis.psl.eu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Observatoire de Paris</a>, emerged from careful analysis of <a href="https://www.nasa.gov" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">NASA</a>'s Cassini spacecraft data. By studying subtle irregularities in Mimas's orbit around Saturn, researchers detected the gravitational signature of liquid water hidden 20 to 30 kilometers beneath the moon's icy shell.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-an-unlikely-ocean-world">An unlikely ocean world</h2>



At only 400 kilometers in diameter, Mimas seemed like the least likely candidate to harbor a subsurface ocean. Unlike other ocean moons such as Europa and Enceladus, which show clear surface signs of internal activity, Mimas displays no obvious hints of the liquid water beneath its ancient, crater-scarred exterior.



"Mimas is a small moon, and its heavily cratered surface gave no hint of the hidden ocean beneath," explained Dr. Nick Cooper from <a href="https://www.qmul.ac.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Queen Mary University of London</a>, a study co-author.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-implications-for-astrobiology">Implications for astrobiology</h2>



The ocean's recent formation makes Mimas a prime target for studying how oceans develop and potentially support life. This discovery adds another member to the exclusive club of ocean worlds in our solar system, each offering unique insights into the conditions necessary for habitability.



The research, published in <a href="https://www.nature.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Nature</a> journal, demonstrates how advanced orbital analysis can reveal hidden features of celestial bodies, opening new possibilities for understanding ocean formation throughout the cosmos.



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Scientists discover unexpected young ocean on Saturn's cratered moon Mimas

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2E0mn5mTvhQ 'Death Star' moon Mimas conceals a 15-million-year-old ocean that...

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y4eLFNYrKE
</div></figure>



On the unforgiving landscape of North Greenland, temperatures drop and sunlight barely penetrates through the polar winter. It was here, however, that an international team of scientists found <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/predatory-worms-were-terror-beasts-half-a-billion-years-ago/#google_vignette" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">evidence of sea monsters</a> that would change our understanding of ocean life in the past.



This video captures the discovery of Timorebestia fossils that had been hidden for more than 500 million years in the Sirius Passet formation. The "terror beasts," as they are called, are a hidden chapter in the evolutionary history of <a href="https://www.earth.com" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Earth</a>, showing that sophisticated predator-prey interactions occurred much earlier than previously envisioned.



Dr. Jakob Vinther and his research team at the <a href="https://www.bristol.ac.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">University of Bristol</a>, in collaboration with researchers at the <a href="https://eng.kopri.re.kr/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Korean Polar Research Institute</a>, braved extreme weather conditions at 82.5 north latitude to locate these giant creatures. Using sophisticated electron microprobe analysis, they revealed the detailed anatomy of the animals, including their muscle and nerve tissues.



The find upsets the traditional timeline of sea predators. Although we've long appreciated that Cambrian oceans were at one time ruled by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWI3-UgA3_o&amp;list=PL1QLQMW9MWDwpkFOnvgAmu7wT6rZmYqdJ&amp;index=19" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">arthropods</a>, these discoveries indicate that relatives of arrow worms were first to dominate the seas. These worms were building sophisticated food webs several million years before other predator groups arose.



Each fossil is a story of ancient hunger, with fossil stomach contents revealing these meter-long beasts dined on heavily armored arthropods regularly, cementing their place as the ocean's first apex predators.



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Worms dominated seas before dinosaurs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y4eLFNYrKE On the unforgiving landscape of North Greenland, temperatures drop...

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ow3JH03PqEQ
</div><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">New York is the site of the world's oldest forest.</figcaption></figure>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-385-million-year-old-trees-discovered">385-million-year-old trees discovered</h2>



Scientists have uncovered something extraordinary just two hours north of New York City. The <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/worlds-oldest-forest-discovered-close-to-new-york-city/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">world's oldest forest</a>, dating back 385 million years, offers a window into how Earth's first complex forests shaped our planet's atmosphere.



Located near <a href="https://townofcairo.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Cairo, New York</a>, in Greene County, these weren't merely primitive plants struggling to survive. These were sophisticated trees with root systems remarkably similar to modern forests. This ancient woodland predates dinosaurs by 140 million years.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-cairo-forest-discovery">The Cairo forest discovery</h2>



385 million years ago, upstate New York was a tropical paradise near the equator. Thanks to continental drift, this ancient forest has traveled thousands of miles to its current location.



The fossil forest sits in an abandoned quarry, roughly half the size of a football field. This represents just a slice of what was likely a massive forest system stretching from New York into Pennsylvania.



Charles Ver Straeten, curator of sedimentary rocks at the <a href="https://www.nysm.nysed.gov/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">New York State Museum</a>, made the discovery in 2009. While scouting the former highway department property, his trained eye spotted wandering patterns in the stone that looked like marine features.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-revolutionary-age-and-preservation">Revolutionary age and preservation</h2>



The site contains 385-million-year-old rocks with fossilized woody roots forming horizontal patterns up to 18 feet (5.5 meters) wide. As Christopher Berry, a paleobotanist at Cardiff University, explains: "You are walking through the roots of ancient trees."



This discovery pushes back advanced tree evolution by millions of years. The research, published in <a href="https://www.cell.com/current-biology/home" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Current Biology</a> in December 2019, fundamentally changes our understanding of when complex forests first emerged.



Researchers believe a massive flood buried the forest floor, creating perfect fossilization conditions. Over millions of years, sediment hardened into rock, preserving these root patterns like nature's time capsule.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-meet-archaeopteris-the-first-modern-tree">Meet Archaeopteris: the first modern tree</h2>



The star of this ancient forest is Archaeopteris – not to be confused with the feathered dinosaur Archaeopteryx. This tree was far older and more revolutionary.



William Stein from <a href="https://www.binghamton.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Binghamton University</a> describes the roots as "strikingly modern, essentially what you'd see outside in my yard right now." These weren't simple root systems you'd expect from ancient plants.



Some fossilized roots are six inches (15 centimeters) in diameter, forming 36-foot-wide (11-meter) patterns. These giants grew up to 65 feet (20 meters) tall with five-foot-diameter (1.5-meter) trunks.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-climate-changing-impact">Climate-changing impact</h2>



These trees fundamentally changed Earth's environment. Kevin Boyce, a Stanford University geoscientist, explains how their deep roots triggered "weathering," chemical reactions that pulled carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.



This process dropped atmospheric CO2 levels from 10-15 times higher than today to roughly modern concentrations. These ancient trees helped create atmospheric conditions that made complex life possible.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-ancient-forest-ecosystem">Ancient forest ecosystem</h2>



The forest was remarkably diverse. Scientists identified Eospermatopteris, palm tree-like plants with short roots that reached 30 feet (9 meters) tall but lacked woody structure. The forest also housed cladoxylopsids and a mysterious third species still being studied.



All reproduced through spores rather than seeds – millions of years before seeds evolved. This tropical environment had no grass, flowers, or flying insects, just towering trees creating Earth's first complex forest canopy.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-scientific-significance">Scientific significance</h2>



Before this finding, the Gilboa forest, located 25 miles (40 kilometers) away, held the "oldest forest" title. Cairo's trees are 2-3 million years older, showing that complex forest ecosystems developed much faster than scientists believed possible.



Patricia Gensel, a <a href="https://www.unc.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">University of North Carolina</a> paleobotanist, notes: "The size of those root systems is really changing the picture. Even 20 years ago, researchers assumed trees with such complex root systems didn't evolve so early."



The Cairo site presents three unique root systems, suggesting Devonian period forests were diverse ecosystems with different trees occupying different environmental niches, much like today's forests.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-modern-preservation-efforts">Modern preservation efforts</h2>



In 2022, New York State Senator Michelle Hinchey secured a $170,000 grant for the town of Cairo to construct specialized fencing around the fossil forest site. The town plans to conduct a feasibility study exploring the possibility of creating an educational center and working lab on-site.



Joe Hasenkopf, chair of the Cairo Planning Board, hopes to partner with educational institutions to create a research facility serving scientists, students, and the public.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-lessons-for-today-s-climate">Lessons for today's climate</h2>



Why does a 385-million-year-old forest matter today? It shows how dramatically forests can change Earth's climate. These ancient woodlands created the atmospheric conditions supporting complex life.



Understanding how prehistoric forests transformed the planet helps us appreciate modern forests' critical role in addressing climate change. Forests remain Earth's most effective carbon capture systems.



These prehistoric trees changed Earth's atmosphere by pulling massive amounts of carbon dioxide from the air. As we face modern climate challenges, this ancient forest reminds us of trees' incredible power to transform our planet's environment.



The next time you walk through a forest, remember you're experiencing an ecosystem whose blueprint was established 385 million years ago in upstate New York. These ancient pioneers didn't just survive – they thrived and changed the world forever.



The full study was published in the journal Current Biology.



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Earth's oldest forest found in the United States

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ow3JH03PqEQ New York is the site of the world's oldest...

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prrq8Ql81zk
</div><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Acid rain and a crisis solved.</figcaption></figure>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-why-don-t-we-ever-hear-about-acid-rain-anymore-the-environmental-crisis-that-was-solved">Why don't we ever hear about "acid rain" anymore? The environmental crisis that was solved</h2>



Remember the 1980s when acid rain dominated headlines? Dire warnings about rain eating buildings, killing fish, and destroying forests filled every news cycle. Then, almost like magic, acid rain vanished from public discourse. What happened? Did we actually solve one of the late 20th century's most pressing environmental challenges?



The answer might surprise you. Unlike many environmental issues that drag on indefinitely, acid rain represents one of modern history's most successful ecological recovery stories. It's a tale of science, politics, and technology working together to tackle what seemed impossible.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">What was acid rain?</h2>



Acid rain isn't regular rain having a bad day – it's precipitation that became significantly more acidic due to air pollution. When power plants, factories, and vehicles burn fossil fuels, they release sulfur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) into the atmosphere.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">The science behind it</h2>



Think of acid rain as nature's chemistry experiment gone wrong. These compounds react with water, oxygen, and other chemicals to form sulfuric and nitric acids. When mixed with water vapor in clouds, they create precipitation with dangerously low pH levels.



While clean rain has a pH of about 5.6, acid rain could drop as low as 4.2 to 4.4 – roughly as acidic as tomato juice or coffee. According to US Geological Survey documentation, Scottish chemist Angus Smith first coined "acid rain" in 1872, but it didn't become a household phrase until the 1960s and 1970s when Swedish scientist Svante Odén documented its devastating effects on Scandinavian lakes and European forests.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">The crisis at its peak</h2>



During the height of public concern, environmental damage was both widespread and visible. This wasn't some abstract future threat – people could see destruction happening in real-time.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Environmental devastation</h2>



The most dramatic impacts were impossible to ignore. Research documented by the Adirondack Lakes Survey Corporation and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation shows that in the Adirondack Mountains, more than 200 lakes became so acidic they couldn't support fish life. The Adirondack Council reports that 409 lakes once supported brook trout, but many lost their fish populations due to acid rain.



By 1976, when scientists cataloged all acidified lakes in the Adirondack Park, researchers found that half of the lakes over 2,000 feet above sea level had no fish, according to studies published in environmental journals. The acidification process worked like a slow-motion disaster. As acid rain fell into watersheds, it gradually lowered pH levels. Fish couldn't survive in acidic water, and their food sources died off too.



Trees at high elevations showed stress directly linked to acid rain. It weakened them by leaching nutrients and making them susceptible to disease. Historical records show Germany's Black Forest saw nearly half its trees damaged by the mid-1980s.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Economic impact</h2>



Acid rain wasn't just environmental – it was expensive. Acidic precipitation corroded infrastructure, buildings, and monuments. Historic stone structures deteriorated at accelerated rates. Tourism suffered as lakes became fishless and forests declined. EPA economic analyses from the period documented repair costs mounting into billions annually.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">The solution: government action and technology</h2>



Transformation from crisis to success required unprecedented cooperation between governments, industries, and environmental groups.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">The Clean Air Act of 1990</h2>



The turning point came with the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, signed by President George H.W. Bush. This represented a fundamentally new approach to environmental regulation, as documented in EPA historical records.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Cap-and-trade success</h2>



Instead of mandating specific technologies, the 1990 amendments introduced something revolutionary: a cap-and-trade system for sulfur dioxide emissions. EPA program documentation shows this market-based approach set overall limits but allowed companies to trade emission allowances.



The genius was harnessing market forces to find cost-effective pollution reduction. Companies reducing emissions cheaply could sell excess allowances to those facing higher costs. Research published in environmental economics journals and EPA progress reports shows this resulted in dramatic SO2 reduction at a fraction of projected costs.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Technology advances</h2>



Policy provided the framework, but technology made reductions possible. Studies in atmospheric science journals document the widespread adoption of flue gas desulfurization systems ("scrubbers") that removed sulfur dioxide before it reached the atmosphere. By the 2000s, new installations could remove over 95% of SO2 emissions, according to EPA technical reports.



The push coincided with cleaner energy development. Natural gas produces fewer sulfur compounds than coal. Wind and solar, emerging in the 1990s, captured growing market share, reducing reliance on high-sulfur coal.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-why-we-don-t-hear-about-it-today">Why we don't hear about it today</h2>



Why did acid rain disappear from headlines? Simple: the problem was largely solved.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Success doesn't make news</h2>



There's an old journalism saying: "If it bleeds, it leads." Environmental success stories don't generate urgency like crisis reporting. Media attention shifted to other challenges: climate change, plastic pollution, and biodiversity loss. There's only so much environmental anxiety the public can absorb, and newer concerns replaced acid rain.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Mission accomplished</h2>



The primary reason is beautifully simple: interventions worked. EPA monitoring data shows sulfur dioxide emissions dropped over 90% since 1990. Academic research published in environmental science journals confirms pH levels in formerly affected areas returned closer to normal. This represents one of history's most dramatic environmental recoveries. Studies by the Adirondack Lakes Survey Corporation show fishless lakes now support healthy populations. Forests recovered, and building damage slowed dramatically.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-is-it-really-gone">Is it really gone?</h2>



The crisis is largely resolved, but monitoring data shows the problem isn't completely eliminated – it's managed to acceptable levels. Some areas still experience occasional events during high pollution periods. International environmental research indicates that rapidly industrializing Asian countries face similar problems to what we experienced decades ago, though they're implementing successful strategies.



EPA research shows nitrogen oxide emissions proved more challenging than sulfur dioxide, coming from vehicles and mobile sources. Climate science studies suggest changing weather patterns add complexity to how acid rain forms and falls.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">What this teaches us</h2>



The acid rain experience proves that seemingly intractable environmental problems can be solved with scientific understanding, political will, and technological innovation. Environmental monitoring data shows recovery speed was remarkable – within a decade, measurable improvements appeared in air quality and ecosystem health.



Success came from bipartisan support across party lines. Policy analysis studies show the market-based approach appealed to those preferring economic incentives while achieving environmental goals. This support created lasting policy surviving political changes.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Conclusion</h2>



Acid rain's disappearance from public consciousness represents environmental science's greatest success stories. Through effective regulation, technological innovation, and international cooperation, we transformed an overwhelming crisis into a manageable challenge.



Today's silence isn't because we forgot – it's because we solved it. The 1990 Clean Air Act, combined with technology and energy market changes, reduced acid rain emissions over 90%, according to comprehensive EPA data analysis.



This success offers hope for current challenges. It proves complex problems can be solved when science, policy, and technology work together. As we face climate change and plastic pollution, acid rain reminds us that dramatic positive change is possible.



Next time someone asks whether environmental regulations work, remember acid rain. It's proof that sometimes, we get it right.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Sources: This article draws from EPA official documentation and progress reports, peer-reviewed research published in environmental and atmospheric science journals, historical data from the Adirondack Lakes Survey Corporation, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation records, US Geological Survey publications, policy analysis studies, and environmental monitoring data collected over three decades.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Frequently Asked Questions</h2>



1. Is acid rain completely gone? No, but EPA monitoring shows it's reduced to manageable levels. US sulfur dioxide emissions dropped over 90% since 1990, making acid rain much less severe than the 1980s crisis.



2. How long did solving take? Environmental monitoring data shows significant improvements began within 5-10 years of 1990s emission controls. Full ecosystem recovery took longer – some areas need 20-30 years for complete recovery.



3. What made the solution successful? Clear scientific understanding, visible damage motivating action, bipartisan support, available technology, and innovative market-based policies like cap-and-trade.



4. Do other countries have acid rain problems? Yes, particularly rapidly industrializing Asian countries. However, international environmental research shows many implement similar successful control strategies.



5. Could acid rain return? Potentially, if regulations weaken or we return to high-sulfur coal without controls, though effects would take years to become severe according to environmental projections.



6. Can you recommend any teaching tools on the subject of "acid rain"? The United States Environmental Protection Agency produced a wonderful teacher's guide for ages 14 and under that you can find on the EPA website here: <a href="https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2017-03/documents/teachersguide.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2017-03/documents/teachersguide.pdf</a>



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The environmental problem we actually solved

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prrq8Ql81zk Acid rain and a crisis solved. Why don't we...

Fresh,Radish,Harvest,On,Soil,In,Garden.

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://youtu.be/Fi2OeEwuzRM?si=vTyd2m9FMmtyWkex
</div></figure>







Mid-July is an opportune time to kick-start a thriving fall garden, and this guide lays out the best vegetables and herbs to plant now for a fruitful autumn harvest. 



Fast-growing leafy greens such as spinach, lettuce, kale, and arugula perform especially well in the waning summer heat, with harvests beginning as soon as 30 days. 



These cool-season crops relish the transition into fall, offering repeated yields with cut-and-come-again methods.



Root vegetables like radishes, carrots, and beets also excel during this period. Radishes deliver satisfaction in under a month, while carrots and beets mature in about two months. Employing succession planting ensures a continuous stream of produce deep into the cooler months. 



For a boost of fresh flavor, herbs like cilantro, basil, dill, and chervil are excellent picks. These heat-loving varieties flourish in July’s warmth and are harvest-ready in about 30 days, especially when sown continuously.



Gardeners in zones 6 through 9 can benefit from planting bush beans and snap peas, which don’t require trellising and are ideal for compact plots. 



Maturing in 50–60 days, they’re a smart choice for quick, protein-rich harvests. For those in hotter regions, heat-tolerant crops such as okra and southern peas provide reliable yields and thrive in scorching conditions.



This guide emphasizes more than crop selection—it highlights the importance of timing, soil preparation, and ongoing sowing techniques. 



With thoughtful planning and attention to regional climate needs, even late-summer gardeners can enjoy fresh salads, hearty stews, and the satisfaction of a robust, homegrown harvest well into fall.



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What to plant in your garden in mid-July

https://youtu.be/Fi2OeEwuzRM?si=vTyd2m9FMmtyWkex Mid-July is an opportune time to kick-start a thriving...

Green,Ecoduct,Over,An,Empty,Highway,During,Sunset.

<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://youtu.be/XYgiPzmNBTU?si=eFYY7gPHU1JznLvU
</div></figure>



A new long-term study in Monkton, Vermont, reveals that wildlife tunnels significantly reduce amphibian road mortality during seasonal migrations. 



Frogs and salamanders often cross roads to reach breeding ponds each spring, but many are killed by vehicles. 



Researchers from the <a href="https://www.uvm.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">University of Vermont</a>, in collaboration with local citizens and the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources, installed two underpass tunnels in 2015. 



Over a 12-year monitoring period, they observed an 80.2% reduction in amphibian deaths, and up to 94% for non-climbing species like salamanders. 



The study used a before-after-control-impact design and documented more than 5,200 amphibians, highlighting the tunnels’ effectiveness even in nearby buffer zones.



Funded at $342,397 - far cheaper than wildlife crossings for large mammals - the project showcased the power of community-led conservation.



Local groups initiated the effort after observing mass amphibian deaths. Wildlife cameras later captured over 2,200 amphibians using a tunnel in just one spring, along with other species like raccoons and bobcats, indicating wider ecosystem benefits.



This marks the first peer-reviewed, long-term data set in the northeastern U.S. confirming amphibian-specific underpasses work. 



The study urges transportation departments to incorporate these designs into road planning and highlights how community action, thoughtful infrastructure, and persistence can make a real difference for biodiversity.



The full study was published in the <a href="https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S1617138125000780" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Journal for Nature Conservation</a>.



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-----

Wildlife tunnels save millions of amphibians

https://youtu.be/XYgiPzmNBTU?si=eFYY7gPHU1JznLvU A new long-term study in Monkton, Vermont, reveals that...

Scientists are transforming chocolate into a functional food by infusing it with probiotics and prebiotics, aiming to create a treat that satisfies cravings while supporting gut health. 



The challenge lies in maintaining chocolate's beloved texture and flavor while adding health benefits.



<figure class="wp-block-embed aligncenter is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
https://youtu.be/Ug657J67iEo?si=w96YjGMsg939LD_3
</div></figure>



Probiotics - beneficial microbes that balance gut bacteria and aid digestion - are typically fragile and can be destroyed by stomach acid or processing. 



Prebiotics act as food for these microbes, helping them thrive. Together, they form "synbiotics," a powerful health combination.



Researchers Smriti Gaur and Shubhi Singh from India's Jaypee Institute of Information Technology took an innovative approach, using natural prebiotics like corn and honey instead of complex processing methods. 



They created five chocolate varieties: a control and four synbiotic versions containing different combinations of prebiotics, probiotics (Lactobacillus strains), and flavor enhancers (cinnamon or orange).



Laboratory simulations of human digestion showed the probiotics remained viable for over five hours, suggesting they could survive long enough to benefit gut health.



Taste tests were positive, with researchers particularly enjoying the orange-flavored variety, describing it as having "vibrant citrus notes" complementing the "rich cocoa" with a "luxurious" texture.



This research represents just the beginning. With further refinement of strains, textures, and flavors, chocolate could evolve beyond mere indulgence to become a functional food that nourishes while it delights.



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsfoodscitech.4c00741" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ACS Food Science &amp; Technology</a>.

Is chocolate the next nutritional powerhouse?

Scientists are transforming chocolate into a functional food by infusing...

<div class="wp-block-sendtonews-playerselector">[sendtonews key="0ynNMYkMKa-2340414-12187" type="single"]</div>



Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Nushagak Bay, a large estuary in southwest Alaska. Nushagak runs mainly north to south and exits in Bristol Bay, a large body of water in the Bering Sea.



"The bay is primarily fed by the Nushagak River, which begins in the Alaska Range and flows southwest approximately 450 km. The bay is also fed by several additional rivers including the Wood, Igushik, Snake and Weary rivers," says ESA.



"The dark colors of the Nushagak River are most likely due to tannins or lignins (chemical substances found in plants). Tannins and lignins from roots, leaves, seeds, bark and soil can leach into the water and give it a brown or even black colour. The sediments then flow southwards where it is mixed with the bluer waters of the bay."



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Nushagak Bay in southwest Alaska

[sendtonews key="0ynNMYkMKa-2340414-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> (ACS) reveals that proteins on flu viruses are actually flexible, tilting and waving in a “breath-like” motion. According to the experts, these proteins could be used to better defend against the flu.



"The main antigenic targets of influenza virus are two surface glycoproteins, hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA). Whereas the structural and dynamical properties of both glycoproteins have been studied previously, the understanding of their plasticity in the whole-virion context is fragmented," wrote the researchers.



To investigate, the team conducted detailed simulations of the influenza A H1N1 virion, or the swine flu. The experts concluded that the visualizations show many new vulnerable states of flu viruses, which could improve future vaccines and antiviral drugs.



Video/ Image Credit: American Chemical Society&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Flu viruses are more flexible than expected

[sendtonews key="G9bUoxcjr4-2511624-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

<div class="wp-block-sendtonews-playerselector">[sendtonews key="3upvlAaHgO-2256633-12187" type="single"]</div>



Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Lake Trasimeno, which is located west of Perugia in central Italy. It is the fourth largest lake in the country. While Trasimeno’s water level varies, it has a maximum depth of approximately six meters.&nbsp;



"In this Copernicus Sentinel-2 image, captured on 6 August 2022, the lake’s emerald green colour is likely due to the presence of phytoplankton. Streaks in the water, particularly visible in the west, indicate the presence of soil and sediments which have been stirred up by winds. Dark colored waters in the southern part of the lake indicate a presence of submerged and floating macrophytes (aquatic plants) as well as algae," says ESA.



"Surrounded by hills on three sides, Trasimeno is subject to heavy storms created by winds, especially from the north and west. There are three islets in the lake: Maggiore, Minore and Polvese (the largest). The lake’s shores are sparsely inhabited with only two popular villages: Castiglione del Lago and Passignano sul Trasimeno."



"Italy is experiencing its worst drought in 70 years which has affected drinking water supplies, hydroelectric power and agricultural production. High temperatures, hot winds and lack of rainfall are the main causes of drought in the Umbrian region which saw Lake Trasimeno’s drop 1.3 m, reaching the limit of the hydrometric zero in July 2022."



Video/Image Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Lake Trasimeno in Central Italy

[sendtonews key="3upvlAaHgO-2256633-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> describes a new self-powered nanosensor that can instantly detect mercury contamination with the tap of a finger.&nbsp;



The oxidized form of mercury can be harmful when it is ingested through contaminated water or food. This makes it necessary for experts to develop sensors that can quickly and accurately detect the presence of mercury.&nbsp;



Zong-Hong Lin and colleagues have now created a triboelectric nanosensor (TENS) that can detect mercury by simply by touching a sample. According to the researchers, their TENS could serve as the basis for similar devices to safely and remotely monitor other pollutants.



Video Credit: American Chemical Society&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Detecting mercury contamination with the tap of a finger

[sendtonews key="LvS8v8bp9z-2564889-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

<div class="wp-block-sendtonews-playerselector">[sendtonews key="X0f6OHYoI4-2310561-12187" type="single"]</div>



Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> explores the ability of salt to transform the way that foods and beverages taste. Salt is known to cover up undesirable flavors, such as bitterness in coffee or beer, but how exactly does sodium chloride change the taste of other compounds?



One previous study showed that, not only does salt suppress bitterness, but also enhances sweetness and sourness. Another study revealed that bitterness reduction by salt seems to be happening at the tongue receptor level as well as in the brain.&nbsp;



While it is known that salt taste is mediated by the presence of sodium channels in the form of taste buds, experts believe that there is also an unknown receptor responsible for how we taste salt that has not yet been identified.&nbsp;



Video Credit: ACS Reactions



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

How does salt makes things taste better?

[sendtonews key="X0f6OHYoI4-2310561-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

<div class="wp-block-sendtonews-playerselector">[sendtonews key="JRaP49ISmm-2357509-12187" type="single"]</div>



Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Santiago, the capital city of Chile. The city is located in the center of the Santiago Metropolitan Region, which has a population of about eight million people.&nbsp;



'The weather of Santiago resembles the Mediterranean climate with dry and warm summers with temperatures reaching up to 35°C (from October to March) and cool and humid winters that can drop to 0°C (from April to September)."



"The city lies in the centre of the country’s central valley around 80 km from the Pacific Ocean to the west and borders Argentina to the east. A tiny part of Argentina is visible in the top-right corner of the image where the mountain crest of the Andes Mountains acts as a divider between the two countries," says ESA.



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



---



By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Santiago, Chile in South America

[sendtonews key="JRaP49ISmm-2357509-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

Spiral,Galaxy,,Illustration,Of,Milky,Way

<div class="wp-block-sendtonews-playerselector">[sendtonews key="e4ZG0Jawp3-2374785-12187" type="single"]</div>



Astronomers at <a href="https://www.jhu.edu/">Johns Hopkins University</a> have created an interactive map of the universe, including the actual position and real colors of 200,000 galaxies. The map allows the public to access data that was previously only available to scientists.



The map was developed using data collected by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. For over two decades, a telescope in New Mexico was aimed at slightly different locations to capture the night sky.&nbsp;



"Growing up I was very inspired by astronomy pictures, stars, nebulae and galaxies, and now it's our time to create a new type of picture to inspire people," said map creator Brice Ménard, a professor at Johns Hopkins. "Astrophysicists around the world have been analyzing this data for years, leading to thousands of scientific papers and discoveries. But nobody took the time to create a map that is beautiful, scientifically accurate, and accessible to people who are not scientists. Our goal here is to show everybody what the universe really looks like."



"In this map, we are just a speck at the very bottom, just one pixel. And when I say we, I mean our galaxy, the Milky Way which has billions of stars and planets. We are used to seeing astronomical pictures showing one galaxy here, one galaxy there or perhaps a group of galaxies. But what this map shows is a very, very different scale."



"From this speck at the bottom, we are able to map out galaxies across the entire universe, and that says something about the power of science."



The <a href="https://mapoftheuniverse.net/">interactive map</a> is available online, where it can be downloaded for free.



Video Credit: Johns Hopkins&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Interactive map of the universe includes 200,000 galaxies

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Lesotho: Africa's "Kingdom in the Sky" Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features northwest Lesotho in South Africa.



According to ESA, Lesotho is the only nation in the world that lies completely above 1,000 m in elevation. The country is famous for its tall mountains and narrow valleys, and is known as Africa's "Kingdom in the Sky."



Out of a population of around two million people, about 80 percent live in rural areas. More than 75 percent of these people are engaged in <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/climate-change-will-have-a-global-impact-on-agriculture/">agriculture</a>, including rainfed cereal production and animal grazing.&nbsp;



ESA reports that the country’s agricultural system faces a growing number of issues, with climate-related vulnerabilities such as drought, floods and extreme temperatures occurring more frequently. 



Diamonds are amongst the minerals found in the mountains. Indeed, Lesotho can truly be called the Kingdom in the Sky. Beautiful, culturally rich, safe, affordable, and easily accessible from Durban and Johannesburg, mountainous Lesotho is a vastly underrated travel destination. the Kingdom of Lesotho (Sotho: 'Muso oa Lesotho) is an enclaved country in southern Africa. It is just over 30,000 km2 (11,583 sq mi) in size and has a population of around 2 million.



Video Credit: ESA&nbsp;&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer 



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Lesotho: Africa's "Kingdom in the Sky"

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Dublin, the capital and largest city of Ireland. Beyond its pub culture, Dublin is known as a modern culinary destination and a UNESCO City of Literature.



"Dublin is located near the midpoint of Ireland’s east coast in the province of Leinster. The city, which covers an area of around 115 square kilometers, is bordered by the Dublin Mountains, a low mountain range to the south, and is surrounded by flat farmland to the north and west," says ESA.



"The city straddles the River Liffey, which rises in the Wicklow Mountains and flows around 80 kilometers eastwards through the city of Dublin, in which it is canalised and bordered with quays. It then empties into Dublin Bay, an arm of the Irish Sea."



Dublin has an abundance of green spaces, including one of the largest enclosed public parks in any European capital city. Phoenix Park, which was originally formed as a royal hunting park in the 1660s, includes 707 hectares of green space.



Video Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The city of Dublin on Ireland's east coast

[sendtonews key="qjvhBOBnY8-2426650-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features the province of Zaragoza in northeast Spain. The image was captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission.



"Together with the provinces of Huesca and Teruel, Zaragoza formed the old kingdom of Aragon. Its capital, also called Zaragoza (not visible in this image) is home to around half of Aragon’s population," says ESA.



"The Ebro River can be seen winding its way through the province from west to east in this image. Between its source in the Cantabrian Mountains in the northwest and its delta on the Mediterranean coast, the Ebro River is fed by more than 200 tributaries as it flows 910 km across much of northern Spain."



Since rainfall is very scarce in this region, irrigation in the Ebro basin is critically important. In the valleys surrounding the Ebro River, many fields are used for growing crops such as corn, wheat, and barley.



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The province of Zaragoza in northeast Spain

[sendtonews key="oL4FnPTGCV-2384527-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> reveals the evolution of the Columbia Glacier in southeastern Alaska. Columbia is among the fastest shrinking glaciers in the world, and the video documents its rapid retreat over the years.&nbsp;



Columbia Glacier is a large, multi-branched calving glacier that flows out of the Chugach Mountains to the Prince William Sound.&nbsp;



According to USGS, Columbia had a long history of stability prior to 1980, with a length 41 miles, and small, short-lived advances or retreats.



In the years since 1980, however, satellite images have captured Columbia’s alarming retreat. By using false-color images, scientists can distinguish between snow and ice, open water, vegetation, and rocky debris on the glacier’s surface.



The series of false-color images featured in today's video were acquired over the span of 35 years. You can see that by 2021, the glacier’s main branch had retreated about 15 miles from its initial position.



The Columbia Glacier has also lost more than 50 percent of its volume, mostly due to calving. <a href="https://www.earth.com/video/nasa-reveals-3d-visual-of-an-atmospheric-river/">NASA</a> reports that while climate change likely started the retreat, mechanical processes kept the disintegration going.



The NASA images are provided by Jesse Allen, Robert Simmon, Joshua Stevens, and Lauren Dauphin using data from Landsat satellites, from the U.S. Geological Survey, and data from MODIS on NASA’s Terra satellite. The structure of Columbia’s moraine played a large role in the stability of the glacier before 1980. 



Like other tidewater glaciers, the Columbia built up a moraine over time, and the mixture of ice and rock functioned like a dam keeping out the sea. It was supported on one end by the shoreline and by the underwater terminal moraine at the other.



Video Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/&nbsp; NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The rapid retreat of the Columbia Glacier

[sendtonews key="0879czfG3k-1785905-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features the Pyrenees Mountains, which form a natural boundary between France and Spain in southwest Europe.



The mountain range is 430 kilometers in length. It stretches from the Mediterranean Sea on the east to the Atlantic Ocean on the west.



At an elevation of 3404 meters, Pico de Aneto is the highest mountain peak in the Pyrenees, and the third-highest peak in Spain. Pico de Aneto is located in the Posets-Maladeta Natural Park, which spans more than 82,000 acres.&nbsp;



"Geological studies have revealed that the Pyrenees Mountains have been around for longer than the Alps, with their sediments first deposited in coastal basins during the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras," reports ESA.



"The entire mountain range formed due to the upwelling of large sedimentary rocks by the collision of the Iberian and the Eurasian plate around 100 to 150 million years ago, followed by intense erosion from ice and water."



The western Pyrenees receive more precipitation due to moisture blowing in from the Atlantic Ocean. The mountain range contains many lakes, several small glaciers, and some of the highest waterfalls in Europe.



Video &amp; Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The Pyrenees Mountains in southwest Europe

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes two exoplanets that are orbiting a star 218 light-years away. A team of researchers led by the University of Montreal has found evidence that these planets are "water worlds."



The experts used data from NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes. They discovered that exoplanets Kepler-138 c and Kepler-138 could be composed largely of water.



"We previously thought that planets that were a bit larger than Earth were big balls of metal and rock, like scaled-up versions of Earth, and that's why we called them super-Earths," explained study co-author Björn Benneke.&nbsp;



"However, we have now shown that these two planets, Kepler-138 c and d, are quite different in nature and that a big fraction of their entire volume is likely composed of water. It is the best evidence yet for water worlds, a type of planet that was theorized by astronomers to exist for a long time."



Video Credit: NASA Goddard



Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and Leah Hustak (STScI)



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Two distant planets may be "water worlds"

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