The time has come to gather around and take a well deserved hiatus from all the politics of the day. Science talk is here. New discoveries, new takes on old knowledge, and other bits of news are all available for the perusing in today's information world. Over the fold are selections from the past week from a few of the many excellent science news sites around the world. Today's tidbits include "green" packing material from mushrooms and agricultural wastes, shade grown coffee farms support native bees, signs of reversal of arctic cooling, reducing soot emissions is key to saving Arctic ice, most panda habitat is outside nature reserves, and ancient reptiles make tracks. Pull up a comfy chair. There is plenty of room for everyone. Settle in for one more session of Dr. Possum's science education and entertainment.
Featured Stories
Various packing materials in use today are not always friendly to the environment.
A new packing material that grows itself is now appearing in shipped products across the country.
The composite of inedible agricultural waste and mushroom roots is called Mycobond™, and its manufacture requires just one eighth the energy and one tenth the carbon dioxide of traditional foam packing material.
And unlike most foam substitutes, when no longer useful, it makes great compost in the garden.
Because the feedstock is based on renewable resources, he adds, the material has an economic benefit as well: it is not prone to the price fluctuations common to synthetic materials derived from such sources as petroleum.
Coffee lovers of the world unite and drink more shade grown coffee.
Shade-grown coffee farms support native bees that help maintain the health of some of the world's most biodiverse tropical regions.
Previous studies have demonstrated that shade-grown farms boost biodiversity by providing a haven for migratory birds, nonmigratory bats and other beneficial creatures. Shade-coffee farms also require far less synthetic fertilizer, pesticides and herbicides than sun-coffee plantations.
In the last century some parts of the Arctic experienced cooling but the trend may be reversing.
...temperatures have been rising steeply since 1990. This is the finding of a summer temperature reconstruction for the past 400 years produced on the base of tree rings from regions beyond the Arctic Circle.
The continued loss of Arctic ice may be slowed or reversed by reduced soot emissions according to researchers.
(Researcher) Jacobson found that eliminating soot produced by the burning of fossil fuels and solid biofuels could reduce warming above parts of the Arctic Circle in the next 15 years by up to 1.7 degrees Celsius. For perspective, net warming in the Arctic has been at least 2.5 degrees Celsius during the last century and is expected to warm significantly more in the future if nothing is done.
The most immediate, effective and low-cost way to reduce soot emissions is to put particle traps on vehicles, diesel trucks, buses and construction equipment. Particle traps filter out soot particles from exhaust fumes.
Soot could be further reduced by converting vehicles to run on clean, renewable electric power.
Many resources have been applied to protection and study of the endangered giant panda.
...research by an international team of scientists shows that much suitable panda habitat is outside the nature reserves and areas where the panda is reported to live.
The research team developed habitat models using geographical/environmental information gathered by satellites overlaid with information on panda occurrence. After analyzing the six mountain regions in the three provinces where pandas are known to live, the scientists developed a habitat suitability index for the entire 48,328-square-mile area.
The range-wide habitat analysis model gives governments and other agencies a new tool as they develop conservation strategies and priorities – it can be used for many other endangered species.
It has long been thought reptiles were the first animals to make the dry interior land their home.
The 318-million-year-old reptile footprints were found in sea-cliffs on the Bay of Fundy, New Brunswick, Canada. They show that reptiles were the first vertebrates (animals with a backbone) to conquer dry continental interiors. These pioneers paved the way for the diverse ecosystems that exist on land today.
Other Worthy Stories of the Week
High speed laser chips move data at 50Gbps (50 gigabits per second)
Using rocket science to make water treatment sustainable
Radical new computer memory? Colossal magnetoresistance
Native-like spider silk produced in metabolically engineered bacteria
Urine--Waste product or future energy source
A future with or without trees: Study Estimates Future Greenhouse Gas Emissions From Brazilian Amazon State
Rocks on Mars may provide link to evidence of living organisms roughly 4 billion years agoCocktails of chemicals may skew fish sex in two rivers in Alberta
More frequent, more intense heat waves predicted for New York
Segmentation is the secret behind the diversity of animals
Brilliant star in a bright neighborhood
Reforestation projects capture more carbon than industrial plantations
Dune whodunit on Saturn's moon, Titan
Some trees "farm" bacteria to help supply nutrients
Brown dwarf found orbiting a young, sun-like star
For even more science news:
General Science Collectors:
Alpha-Galileo
BBC News Science and Environment
Eureka Science News
LiveScience
New Scientist
PhysOrg.com
SciDev.net
Science/AAAS
Science Alert
Science Centric
Science Daily
Scientific American
Space Daily
Blogs:
A Few Things Ill Considered Techie and Science News
Cantauri Dreams space exploration
Coctail Party Physics Physics with a twist.
Deep Sea News marine biology
Laelaps more vertebrate paleontology
List of Geoscience Blogs
ScienceBlogs
Space Review
Techonology Review
Tetrapod Zoologyvertebrate paleontology
Science Insider
Scientific Blogging.
Wired News
Science RSS Feed: Medworm
The Skeptics Guide to the Universe--a combination of hard science and debunking crap
Daily Kos regular series:
Daily Kos University, a regular series by plf515
This Week in Science by DarkSyde
This Week in Space by nellaselim
Overnight News Digest:Science Saturday by Neon Vincent. This week OND by palantir.
Weekend Science by AKMask
All diaries with the DK GreenRoots Tag.
All diaries with the eKos Tag
NASA picture of the day. For more see the NASA image gallery or the Astronomy Picture of the Day Archive.
Orion Nebula, NASA, Public Domain