Fracking Boom Spurs Environmental Audit
As hydraulic fracturing unlocks new gas reserves, researchers struggle to understand its health implications.
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Huge Ancient Civilization’s Collapse Attributed to Climate Change
The mysterious fall of the largest of the world’s earliest urban civilizations nearly 4,000 years ago in what is now India, Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh now appears to have a key culprit — ancient climate change, researchers say. Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia may be the best known of the first great urban cultures, but the…
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Study Traces Origins of Monogamous Coupling
From an evolutionary standpoint, the key players in the mating game were males with poor fighting skills and females faithful to them.
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Leakey: Evolution Debate Will Soon Be History
Noted paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey says scientific discoveries may soon make the debate over evolution a part of history. The Kenyan-born scientist serves as a professor at Stony Brook University on New York’s Long Island and recently spent a month in New York raising funds for his Turkana Basin Institute. Leakey says the institute welcomes scientists,…
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Cultural Beliefs, Not Science Education Split Climate Views
Global warming skeptics are not less educated about science but rather use their knowledge to affirm their predetermined beliefs. The new research says that deniers hold their skeptical views due to “opposing sets of cultural values” that help them make a decision on the hot-button environmental issue. “The aim of the study was to test…
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Unusual Quantum Effect Discovered in Photosynthesis
Quantum physics and plant biology seem like two branches of science that could not be more different, but surprisingly they may in fact be intimately tied. Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory and the Notre Dame Radiation Laboratory at the University of Notre Dame used ultrafast spectroscopy to see what…
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Hans Rosling: Religions and Babies
Hans Rosling had a question: Do some religions have a higher birth rate than others — and how does this affect global population growth? Speaking at the TEDxSummit in Qatar, he graphs data over time and across religions. With his trademark humor and sharp insight, Hans reaches a surprising conclusion on world fertility rates.
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Shifting Trade Routes May Have Been Root Cause of Mayan Decline
The end of the classic Mayan civilization in the lowlands of Mesoamerica was likely expedited by shifting trade routes that started to bring valuable goods to coastal regions instead of the inland city-states of the ancient Native Americans. While the cause of this decline is still shrouded in mystery, most scholars consider the period of…
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Zoos’ Bitter Choice: To Save Some Species, Letting Others Die
As the number of species at risk of extinction soars, zoos are increasingly being called upon to rescue and sustain animals, and not just for marquee breeds like pandas and rhinos but also for all manner of mammals, frogs, birds and insects whose populations are suddenly crashing. To conserve animals effectively, however, zoo officials have…
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Earth Took 10 Million Years to Recover From Mass Extinction
The Earth’s greatest mass extinction, 250 million years ago, was so severe that it took 10 million years for the planet to recover. Life was nearly wiped out, with only 10% of plants and animals surviving. And the sheer intensity of the crisis, and continuing grim conditions on Earth after the first wave of extinction,…