ScienceDaily: Top Environment News

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• New NASA probe will study Earth's forests in 3-D
• Study puts some mussels into Bay restoration
• Sun-powered desalination for villages in India
• Bacteria from bees possible alternative to antibiotics
• New knowledge of cannabis paves way for drug development
• Climate change to increase forest fire danger in Europe
• Sleeping on animal fur in infancy found to reduce risk of asthma
• Climate change and European forests
• Research explains how you bite off the chocolate from nuts
• New mechanism in gene regulation revealed
• Electronic training collars present welfare risk to pet dogs
• Global food trade may not meet all future demand, study indicates
• Targeting protein-making machinery to stop harmful bacteria
• Each day in hospital raises risk of multidrug-resistant infection
• New antifungal as effective as existing drugs with fewer adverse events
• Inexpensive lab test identifies resistant infections in hours
• Dynamic duo takes out cellular trash: Research finds how dead cells are removed from body
• Flour identified as main cause of occupational asthma in France
• Timing of food intake could impact effectiveness of tuberculosis treatment
• New single-dose influenza drug appears safe, effective
• Antibiotic stewardship programs reduce costs, improve outcomes
• Use of dengue vaccine may cause short-term spikes in its prevalence
• Ultra sensitive biosensor from molybdenite semiconductor: Potential for single-molecule detection
• Sugar substitutes not so super sweet after all
• Improving how companies use technology to ship fresh produce
• Biomedical technique applied to reveal changes within body of ocean
• New protagonist in cell reprogramming discovered

New NASA probe will study Earth's forests in 3-D Posted: 08 Sep 2014 09:58 AM PDT A laser-based instrument being developed for the International Space Station will provide a unique 3-D view of Earth's forests, helping to fill in missing information about their role in the carbon cycle.

Study puts some mussels into Bay restoration Posted: 08 Sep 2014 09:15 AM PDT Research in Chesapeake Bay shows that the mussels that typically colonize a restored oyster reef can more than double the reef's overall filtration capacity. Filtering plankton helps improve water quality because these tiny drifting organisms thrive on the excess nitrogen and other nutrients that humans release into the Bay and its tributaries through farming, wastewater outflow, and the burning of fossil fuels.

Sun-powered desalination for villages in India Posted: 08 Sep 2014 06:37 AM PDT Around the world, there is more salty groundwater than fresh, drinkable groundwater. For example, 60 percent of India is underlain by salty water -- and much of that area is not served by an electric grid that could run conventional reverse-osmosis desalination plants. Sun-powered desalination could deliver clean water for off-grid villages.

Bacteria from bees possible alternative to antibiotics Posted: 08 Sep 2014 06:37 AM PDT Thirteen lactic acid bacteria found in the honey stomach of bees have shown promising results in a series of studies. The group of bacteria counteracted antibiotic-resistant MRSA in lab experiments. The bacteria, mixed into honey, has healed horses with persistent wounds. The formula has previously been shown to protect against bee colony collapse.

New knowledge of cannabis paves way for drug development Posted: 08 Sep 2014 06:37 AM PDT Revolutionary nanotechnology method could help improve the development of new medicine and reduce costs. Researchers have developed a new screening method that makes it possible to study cell membrane proteins that bind drugs, such as cannabis and adrenaline, while reducing the consumption of precious samples by a billion times.

Climate change to increase forest fire danger in Europe Posted: 08 Sep 2014 06:36 AM PDT Climate change is expected to contribute to a dramatic increase in forest fire damage in Europe, but better forest management could mitigate the problem, according to new research.

Sleeping on animal fur in infancy found to reduce risk of asthma Posted: 08 Sep 2014 05:37 AM PDT Sleeping on animal fur in the first three months of life might reduce the risk of asthma in later childhood a new study has found. The chance of having asthma at the age of 6 years was 79% lower in children who had slept on animal skin after birth compared with those who were not exposed to animal skin. The risk decreased to 41% by the age of 10.

Climate change and European forests Posted: 08 Sep 2014 05:35 AM PDT Researchers discuss how forest managers and decision makers can cope with climate uncertainties. The authors review general trends in climate, with particular emphasis on biologically meaningful parameters such as continuous dry days and changes in climate extremes and forest disturbance patterns. They also compare observed changes with those predicted by climate change studies and examine the reasons for discrepancies where they exist.

Research explains how you bite off the chocolate from nuts Posted: 08 Sep 2014 05:35 AM PDT Simply biting off the chocolate from a nut dipped in chocolate, instead of biting through both the chocolate and nut requires sophisticated control of the biting power. This is possible owing to an advanced coordination of muscle activation and brake reflexes in different parts of the jaw muscles.

New mechanism in gene regulation revealed Posted: 08 Sep 2014 05:33 AM PDT The information encoded in our genes is translated into proteins, which ultimately mediate biological functions in an organism. Messenger RNA (mRNA) plays an important role, as it is the molecular template used for translation. Scientist have now unraveled a molecular mechanism of mRNA recognition, which is essential for understanding differential gene regulation in male and female organisms.

Electronic training collars present welfare risk to pet dogs Posted: 08 Sep 2014 05:33 AM PDT The results of a recent study have revealed that the immediate effects of training pet dogs with an electronic collar cause behavioural signs of distress, particularly when used at high settings.

Global food trade may not meet all future demand, study indicates Posted: 08 Sep 2014 05:32 AM PDT Global food security and the patterns of food trade that – until this analysis – have been minimally studied, are the focus of new research. As the world population continues to grow, by about 1 billion people every 12 to 14 years since the 1960s, the global food supply may not meet escalating demand -- particularly for agriculturally poor countries in arid to semi-arid regions, such as Africa's Sahel, that already depend on imports for much of their food supply, researchers say.

Targeting protein-making machinery to stop harmful bacteria Posted: 07 Sep 2014 03:12 PM PDT In an effort to kill harmful bacteria -- including so-called super-bugs -- many scientists have been focusing on the ribosomes, which manufacture a cell's proteins. But a biologist now is trying to stop those ribosomes from forming in the first place, and has, for the first time, isolated the middle steps in the process that forms the ribosomes.

Each day in hospital raises risk of multidrug-resistant infection Posted: 07 Sep 2014 03:11 PM PDT If a patient contracts an infection while in the hospital, each day of hospitalization increases by 1 percent the likelihood that the infection will be multidrug-resistant, according to research.

New antifungal as effective as existing drugs with fewer adverse events Posted: 07 Sep 2014 03:11 PM PDT A newly developed antifungal, isavuconazole, is as effective as an existing drug, voriconazole, against invasive mold disease in cancer patients with less adverse effects, according to phase 3 clinical data.

Inexpensive lab test identifies resistant infections in hours Posted: 07 Sep 2014 03:11 PM PDT The protocol for a relatively new test for a dangerous form of antibiotic resistance has been changed by scientists, increasing its specificity to 100 percent. This research confirms the reliability of a test that can provide results in hours and is simple and inexpensive enough to be conducted in practically any clinical laboratory.

Dynamic duo takes out cellular trash: Research finds how dead cells are removed from body Posted: 07 Sep 2014 03:06 PM PDT Scientists have identified how immune cells use two critical receptors to clear dead cells from the body, pointing the way to new autoimmune and cancer therapies. "This basic research focus allowed us to discover a completely new aspect of immune regulation that no one -— including any immunologist—had known about before," said one researcher.

Flour identified as main cause of occupational asthma in France Posted: 07 Sep 2014 05:49 AM PDT Flour has been identified as the main cause of occupational asthma in France, closely followed by cleaning products. The research, which is the largest of its kind to be undertaken in France, aimed to understand who was most affected by the condition and what the main causes were.

Timing of food intake could impact effectiveness of tuberculosis treatment Posted: 07 Sep 2014 05:49 AM PDT The timing of food intake in the early phase of tuberculosis treatment could have a negative impact on the effectiveness of TB treatment. Research suggests that eating food just before taking a TB drug could reduce the effectiveness of the medicine.

New single-dose influenza drug appears safe, effective Posted: 06 Sep 2014 02:32 PM PDT An analysis of phase 2 and phase 3 clinical trials shows that a single injected dose of the neuraminidase inhibitor peramivir is safe and effective at alleviating influenza symptoms, including fever and viral shedding, when administered within 48 hours of the onset of symptoms.

Antibiotic stewardship programs reduce costs, improve outcomes Posted: 06 Sep 2014 06:30 AM PDT Antibiotic stewardship programs, which promote the appropriate use of antibiotics in hospitals and other healthcare centers, not only lead to reduction in antibiotic use with reduced adverse events, but also lead to significant savings. In the case of one New York hospital, more than $600,000 was saved annually.

Use of dengue vaccine may cause short-term spikes in its prevalence Posted: 05 Sep 2014 06:08 AM PDT As researchers continue to work toward vaccines for serious tropical diseases such as dengue fever, experts caution in a new report that such vaccines will probably cause temporary but significant spikes in the disease in the years after they are first used.

Ultra sensitive biosensor from molybdenite semiconductor: Potential for single-molecule detection Posted: 05 Sep 2014 06:08 AM PDT Researchers have demonstrated an atomically thin, ultrasensitive and scalable molybdenum disulfide field-effect transistor based biosensors and establish their potential for single-molecule detection.

Sugar substitutes not so super sweet after all Posted: 05 Sep 2014 06:08 AM PDT The taste of common sugar substitutes is often described as being much more intense than sugar, but participants in a recent study indicated that these non-nutritive sugar substitutes are no sweeter than the real thing, according to food scientists.

Improving how companies use technology to ship fresh produce Posted: 04 Sep 2014 03:35 PM PDT A new tracking system could change the way companies ship fresh fruits and vegetables, providing consumers the freshest products available. The researchers placed two radio frequency identification (RFID) devices into each pallet of strawberries as they were picked. The devices allowed them to track the strawberries' temperature from the field, through pre-cooling and into trucks. Their theory is that if you know the quality of the produce and the temperatures to which it has been exposed, you will know which produce to deliver first to stores.

Biomedical technique applied to reveal changes within body of ocean Posted: 04 Sep 2014 11:19 AM PDT For decades, medical researchers have sought new methods to diagnose how different types of cells and systems in the body are functioning. Now scientists have adapted an emerging biomedical technique to study the vast body of the ocean.

New protagonist in cell reprogramming discovered Posted: 04 Sep 2014 10:16 AM PDT The role of a protein that is crucial for cell reprogramming has been defined by researchers. The discovery also details the dynamics of this protein as well as its interaction with other factors involved in reprogramming and the maintenance of stem cell pluripotency.

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