ScienceDaily: Top Environment News

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• Tiny structure gives big boost to solar power
• How common 'cat parasite' gets into human brain and influences human behavior
• What happens to plant growth when you remove gravity?
• World's big trees are dying: Alarming increase in death rates among trees 100-300 years old
• Migrating Great Lakes salmon carry contaminants upstream
• Gene network illuminates stress, mutation and adaptation responses
• Drought in the Horn of Africa delays migrating birds
• Biologist treks across Southwestern China to answer the 'killer mushroom' question
• Moths wired two ways to take advantage of floral potluck
• Insect-eating bat outperforms nectar specialist as pollinator of cactus flowers
• Fermi improves its vision for thunderstorm Gamma-ray flashes
• How cold will a winter be in two years? Climate models still struggle with medium-term climate forecasts
• Biochemists trap a chaperone machine in action
• Disgust circuit: Flies sniff out and avoid spoiled food
• At high altitude, carbs are the fuel of choice
• European Romani exodus began 1,500 years ago, DNA evidence shows
• NASA's TRMM satellite provides 3-D analyzation of super-typhoon Bopha
• Arctic continues to break records in 2012: Becoming warmer, greener region with record losses of summer sea ice and late spring snow
• Impacts of climate change on rare tropical plants expected to vary considerably
• Warm sea water is melting Antarctic glaciers
• Bisphenol A: BPA additive blocks cell function
• Emergence of flowering plants: New light shed on Darwin's 'abominable mystery'
• Plant stress paints early picture of drought
• Were cavemen better at drawing animals than modern artists?
• NASA-NOAA satellite reveals new views of Earth at night

Tiny structure gives big boost to solar power Posted: 06 Dec 2012 05:34 PM PST Researchers have found a simple and economic way to nearly triple the efficiency of organic solar cells, the cheap and flexible plastic devices that many scientists believe could be the future of solar power.

How common 'cat parasite' gets into human brain and influences human behavior Posted: 06 Dec 2012 05:32 PM PST A new study demonstrates for the first time how the Toxoplasma gondii parasite enters the brain to influence its host's behavior.

What happens to plant growth when you remove gravity? Posted: 06 Dec 2012 05:31 PM PST It is well known that plant growth patterns are influenced by a variety of stimuli, gravity being one amongst many. On Earth plant roots exhibit characteristic behaviors called 'waving' and 'skewing', which were thought to be gravity-dependent events. However, Arabidopsis plants grown on the International Space Station (ISS) have demonstrated this theory wrong, according to a new study: root 'waving' and 'skewing' occur in spaceflight plants independently of gravity.

World's big trees are dying: Alarming increase in death rates among trees 100-300 years old Posted: 06 Dec 2012 01:25 PM PST The largest living organisms on the planet, the big, old trees that harbor and sustain countless birds and other wildlife, are dying. In a new report, ecologists warns of an alarming increase in death rates among trees 100-300 years old in many of the world's forests, woodlands, savannahs, farming areas and even in cities.

Migrating Great Lakes salmon carry contaminants upstream Posted: 06 Dec 2012 12:36 PM PST Salmon, as they travel upstream to spawn and die, carry industrial pollutants into Great Lakes streams and tributaries.

Gene network illuminates stress, mutation and adaptation responses Posted: 06 Dec 2012 11:20 AM PST Scientists have studied the puzzling response of bacteria to stress and the mutations that result. Now they can put together the pieces of that puzzle, describing most of the members of an elaborate gene network that functions in causing mutations during repair of double-stranded breaks in the DNA of stressed cells.

Drought in the Horn of Africa delays migrating birds Posted: 06 Dec 2012 11:20 AM PST The catastrophic drought last year in the Horn of Africa affected millions of people but also caused the extremely late arrival into northern Europe of several migratory songbird species, a new study shows. Details of the migration route was revealed by data collected from small back-packs fitted on birds showing that the delay resulted from an extended stay in the Horn of Africa.

Biologist treks across Southwestern China to answer the 'killer mushroom' question Posted: 06 Dec 2012 11:13 AM PST The findings shattered a myth started by a 2010 article in the journal Science, claiming the Trogia venenata mushroom contained high concentrations of the metal barium, causing high blood pressure, cardiac arrests and sudden deaths in southwestern China over the past 30 years.

Moths wired two ways to take advantage of floral potluck Posted: 06 Dec 2012 11:13 AM PST Moths are able to enjoy a pollinator's buffet of flowers -- in spite of being among the insect world's picky eaters -- because of two distinct "channels" in their brains, scientists have discovered.

Insect-eating bat outperforms nectar specialist as pollinator of cactus flowers Posted: 06 Dec 2012 10:18 AM PST In a surprising result, scientists have found that the insect-eating pallid bat is a more effective pollinator of cardon cactus flowers than a nectar-feeding specialist, the lesser long-nosed bat.

Fermi improves its vision for thunderstorm Gamma-ray flashes Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:24 AM PST Thanks to improved data analysis techniques and a new operating mode, the Gamma-ray Burst Monitor aboard NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope is now 10 times better at catching the brief outbursts of high-energy light mysteriously produced above thunderstorms.

How cold will a winter be in two years? Climate models still struggle with medium-term climate forecasts Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:23 AM PST How well are the most important climate models able to predict the weather conditions for the coming year or even the next decade? Scientists have evaluated 23 climate models. Their conclusion: there is still a long way to go before reliable regional predictions can be made on seasonal to decadal time scales.

Biochemists trap a chaperone machine in action Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:19 AM PST Molecular chaperones have emerged as exciting new potential drug targets, because scientists want to learn how to stop cancer cells, for example, from using chaperones to enable their uncontrolled growth. Now biochemists have deciphered key steps in the mechanism of the Hsp70 molecular machine by "trapping" this chaperone in action, providing a dynamic snapshot of its mechanism.

Disgust circuit: Flies sniff out and avoid spoiled food Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:19 AM PST The ability to detect rotten food is so crucial for survival that even flies have a dedicated neural circuit to do just that, according to a new study. The brain circuit allows flies to avoid feeding and laying eggs on fruit covered in toxic molds and bacteria and represents a unique, specialized system for detecting a repulsive odor.

At high altitude, carbs are the fuel of choice Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:19 AM PST Mice living in the high-altitude, oxygen-starved environment of the Andean mountains survive those harsh conditions by fueling their muscles with carbohydrates. The findings provide the first compelling evidence of a clear difference in energy metabolism between high- and low-altitude native mammals.

European Romani exodus began 1,500 years ago, DNA evidence shows Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:19 AM PST Despite their modern-day diversity of language, lifestyle, and religion, Europe's widespread Romani population shares a common, if complex, past. It all began in northwestern India about 1,500 years ago, according to a new study that offers the first genome-wide perspective on Romani origins and demographic history.

NASA's TRMM satellite provides 3-D analyzation of super-typhoon Bopha Posted: 06 Dec 2012 07:42 AM PST NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite observed the eyewall of Super-typhoon Bopha in 3-D shortly before noon on Monday, Dec. 3, 2012 (Philippines local time). At that time, Bopha was at category 3 and had begun rapidly intensifying to category 5 prior to landfall in the pre-dawn hours the next morning. Bopha made landfall in the Philippines, on the island of Mindanao.

Arctic continues to break records in 2012: Becoming warmer, greener region with record losses of summer sea ice and late spring snow Posted: 06 Dec 2012 07:39 AM PST The Arctic region continued to break records in 2012 -- among them the loss of summer sea ice, spring snow cover, and melting of the Greenland ice sheet. This was true even though air temperatures in the Arctic were unremarkable relative to the last decade, according to a new report.

Impacts of climate change on rare tropical plants expected to vary considerably Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:45 AM PST New research has found that the impacts of climate change on rare plants in tropical mountains will vary considerably from site to site and from species to species.

Warm sea water is melting Antarctic glaciers Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:45 AM PST The ice sheet in West Antarctica is melting faster than expected. New observations may improve our ability to predict future changes in ice sheet mass.

Bisphenol A: BPA additive blocks cell function Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:43 AM PST Bisphenol A, a substance found in many synthetic products, is considered to be harmful, particularly, for fetuses and babies. Researchers have now shown in experiments on cells from human and mouse tissue that this environmental chemical blocks calcium channels in cell membranes. Similar effects are elicited by drugs used to treat high blood pressure and cardiac arrhythmia.

Emergence of flowering plants: New light shed on Darwin's 'abominable mystery' Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:41 AM PST Research sheds new light on what Charles Darwin famously called "an abominable mystery": the apparently sudden appearance and rapid spread of flowering plants in the fossil record.

Plant stress paints early picture of drought Posted: 05 Dec 2012 05:02 PM PST In July 2012, farmers in the U.S. Midwest and Plains regions watched crops wilt and die after a stretch of unusually low precipitation and high temperatures. Before a lack of rain and record-breaking heat signaled a problem, however, scientists observed another indication of drought in data from NASA and NOAA satellites: plant stress.

Were cavemen better at drawing animals than modern artists? Posted: 05 Dec 2012 05:00 PM PST Prehistoric artists were better at portraying the walk of four-legged animals in their art than modern man, according to new research.

NASA-NOAA satellite reveals new views of Earth at night Posted: 05 Dec 2012 12:18 PM PST Scientists have unveiled an unprecedented new look at our planet at night. A global composite image, constructed using cloud-free night images from a new NASA and NOAA satellite, shows the glow of natural and human-built phenomena across the planet in greater detail than ever before.

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