ScienceDaily: Top Environment News

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• Seeing the forest and the trees: Panoramic, very-high-resolution, time-lapse photography for plant and ecosystem research
• Discovery offers bio-solution to severe canola crop losses
• Global study reveals new hotspots of fish biodiversity
• Ancient soils reveal clues to early life on Earth
• Whale mass stranding attributed to sonar mapping for first time
• Alpine archaeology reveals high life through the ages
• A day in the life of the mysterious odd-clawed spider Progradungula otwayensis
• Sustainable livestock production is possible
• The deep Greenland Sea is warming faster than the world ocean
• Wormlike hematite photoanode breaks the world-record for solar hydrogen production efficiency
• Deep sea ecosystem may take decades to recover from Deepwater Horizon spill
• New genus of electric fish discovered in 'lost world' of South America
• China's synthetic gas plants would be greenhouse giants
• The future of the suburbs
• The 'in-law effect': Male fruit flies sleep around but females keep it in the family
• Lab chemists help find binding site of protein that allows plant growth
• Environmental threat turned sustainable business for the Gulf of California

Seeing the forest and the trees: Panoramic, very-high-resolution, time-lapse photography for plant and ecosystem research Posted: 25 Sep 2013 12:21 PM PDT A new technique uses the GigaPan EPIC Pro, a robotic camera system, to create time-lapse sequences of panoramas that allow the viewer to zoom in at an incredible level of detail, e.g., from a landscape view to that of an individual plant. This system greatly improves the utility of time-lapse photography by capturing interactions between the environment and plant populations in a single sequence.

Discovery offers bio-solution to severe canola crop losses Posted: 25 Sep 2013 10:23 AM PDT A genetic discovery by an international research team offers a solution to a long-standing "green seed problem" that causes millions of dollars annually in canola crop losses.

Global study reveals new hotspots of fish biodiversity Posted: 25 Sep 2013 10:23 AM PDT Teeming with species, tropical coral reefs have been long thought to be the areas of greatest biodiversity for fishes and other marine life -- and thus most deserving of resources for conservation. But a new global study of reef fishes reveals a surprise: when measured by factors other than the traditional species count -- instead using features such as a species' role in an ecosystem -- new hotspots of biodiversity emerge, including some nutrient-rich, temperate waters.

Ancient soils reveal clues to early life on Earth Posted: 25 Sep 2013 10:23 AM PDT Oxygen appeared in the atmosphere up to 700 million years earlier than we previously thought, according to new research, raising new questions about the evolution of early life.

Whale mass stranding attributed to sonar mapping for first time Posted: 25 Sep 2013 10:22 AM PDT An independent scientific review panel has concluded that the mass stranding of approximately 100 melon-headed whales in the Loza Lagoon system in northwest Madagascar in 2008 was primarily triggered by acoustic stimuli, more specifically, a multi-beam echosounder system operated by a survey vessel contracted by ExxonMobil Exploration and Production (Northern Madagascar) Limited.

Alpine archaeology reveals high life through the ages Posted: 25 Sep 2013 08:24 AM PDT Archaeologists have uncovered evidence of human activity in the high slopes of the French Alps dating back over 8000 years.

A day in the life of the mysterious odd-clawed spider Progradungula otwayensis Posted: 25 Sep 2013 07:28 AM PDT Biologists have provided a first-time glimpse into the natural history of the enigmatic spider species Progradungula otwayensis. Lurking in the hollows of old myrtle beech trees and thus hard to collect, this extraordinary spider is an endemic species confined strictly to the beautiful Great Otway National Park.

Sustainable livestock production is possible Posted: 25 Sep 2013 07:28 AM PDT New research has identified what may be the future of sustainable livestock production: silvopastoral systems which include shrubs and trees with edible leaves or fruits as well as herbage.

The deep Greenland Sea is warming faster than the world ocean Posted: 25 Sep 2013 07:28 AM PDT Recent warming of the Greenland Sea Deep Water is about ten times higher than warming rates estimated for the global ocean. Scientists analyzed temperature data from 1950 to 2010 in the abyssal Greenland Sea, which is an ocean area located just to the south of the Arctic Ocean.

Wormlike hematite photoanode breaks the world-record for solar hydrogen production efficiency Posted: 25 Sep 2013 07:28 AM PDT Scientists have developed a "wormlike" hematite photoanode that can convert sunlight and water to clean hydrogen energy with a record-breaking high efficiency of 5.3 percent.

Deep sea ecosystem may take decades to recover from Deepwater Horizon spill Posted: 25 Sep 2013 06:22 AM PDT The deep-sea soft-sediment ecosystem in the immediate area of the 2010's Deepwater Horizon well head blowout and subsequent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico will likely take decades to recover from the spill's impacts, according to a new scientific article.

New genus of electric fish discovered in 'lost world' of South America Posted: 25 Sep 2013 06:22 AM PDT A previously unknown genus of electric fish has been identified in a remote region of South America by team of international researchers. The Akawaio penak, a thin, eel-like electric fish, was discovered in the shallow, murky waters of the upper Mazaruni River is northern Guyana.

China's synthetic gas plants would be greenhouse giants Posted: 25 Sep 2013 06:22 AM PDT Coal-powered synthetic natural gas plants being planned in China would produce seven times more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional natural gas plants, and use up to 100 times the water as shale gas production, according to a new study.

The future of the suburbs Posted: 25 Sep 2013 06:17 AM PDT Few living environments are more universally maligned than the suburbs. The suburbs stand accused of being boring, homogeneous, inefficient, car-oriented, and sterile. Some critics even argue that the suburbs make people fat. While criticisms mount, however, a large proportion of the world's population continues to live in the suburban fringes of growing cities. What factors will affect the future of the suburbs? What changes do planners need to accommodate in planning the next generation of urban growth?

The 'in-law effect': Male fruit flies sleep around but females keep it in the family Posted: 24 Sep 2013 04:36 PM PDT A study of mating preferences in fruit flies (Drosophila) has found that males and females respond to the sexual familiarity of potential mates in fundamentally different ways. While male fruit flies preferred to court an unknown female over their previous mate or her sisters, female fruit flies displayed a predilection for their 'brothers-in-law'.

Lab chemists help find binding site of protein that allows plant growth Posted: 24 Sep 2013 12:36 PM PDT A research team has discovered where a protein binds to plant cell walls, a process that makes it possible for plants to grow. The discovery could lead to bigger harvests for bioenergy.

Environmental threat turned sustainable business for the Gulf of California Posted: 24 Sep 2013 11:03 AM PDT Considered a threat to the biodiversity of marine ecosystems of the Gulf of California, the cannonball jellyfish Stomolophus meleagris is intended to be exploited commercially throughout the Mexican Pacific coast where it is present, thanks to the fishing potential recently discovered.

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