A new study suggests that spring snowmelt in the Alps is occurring earlier in the year, and the earlier warming – due to climate change – threatens vitally important microbial communities in Alpine soils. Source: https://earthsky.org/earth/alps-climate-change-driven-snowmelt-abrupt-seasonal-change…
Tag: Plants
Twitter Announces Paid Super Follows To Let You Charge For Tweets
Twitter announced a pair of big upcoming features today: the ability for users to charge their followers for access to additional content, and the ability to create and join groups based around specific interests. From a report: They’re two of the more substantial changes to Twitter in a while, but they also fit snugly into models that have been popular and…
Can air pollution help us find alien life?
To find alien life in our universe, scientists have considered searches for optical lasers or even giant energy-harvesting structures known as Dyson spheres. Now they’re suggesting a more mundane sort of search, a hunt for air pollution in exoplanet atmospheres. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/can-pollution-help-us-find-alien-life…
Repotting Plants Without Killing Them
Repotting plants can seem like an intimidating or messy task, but with the right information, and a little practice, it is a rather fun activity for you and your plants. In this article: What Does Repotting Plants Mean? Why Is It Important to Repot Plants? What Are the Signs That Plants Need Repotting? When Is…Continue Reading
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Ghana Scientist Tries Gene Editing To Create Healthier Sweet Potatoes
The Cornell Alliance for Science seeks to build “a significant international alliance of partners” to “correct misinformation and counter conspiracy theories” slowing progress on climate change, synthetic biology, agricultural innovations, and other issues. Slashdot reader wooloohoo shares their article about research on Ghana’s first gene-edited crop — a high-yielding sweet potato with increased beta carotone content. “For sweet potatoes, we want…
Are Texas Blackouts a Warning About the Follow-on Effects of Climate Change?
This week in America, “continent-spanning winter storms triggered blackouts in Texas, Oklahoma, Mississippi and several other states,” reports the New York Times. But that was just the beginning… One-third of oil production in the nation was halted. Drinking-water systems in Ohio were knocked offline. Road networks nationwide were paralyzed and vaccination efforts in 20 states were disrupted. The crisis carries a…
Texas Was ‘Seconds and Minutes’ Away From Catastrophic Monthslong Blackouts, Officials Say
Texas’ power grid was “seconds and minutes” away from a catastrophic failure that could have left Texans in the dark for months, officials with the entity that operates the grid said yesterday. Texas Tribune reports: As millions of customers throughout the state begin to have power restored after days of massive blackouts, officials with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or…
Here’s the best place for explorers to harvest ice on Mars
Water ice, especially any located in the sub-surface, has long been a focal point of Mars exploration efforts. Reasons abound as to why—from the need to grow plants to the need to create more rocket fuel to blast off the planet for a round trip. Most of that effort has focused on the poles of the planet, where most of the…
Climate change is making US hay fever season longer and more intense
Pollen seasons in the US have lengthened by about 20 days over 30 years, and there is 21 per cent more pollen in the air, as plants respond to a warming climate and higher levels of carbon dioxide Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2267062-climate-change-is-making-us-hay-fever-season-longer-and-more-intense/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
Pfizer Is Doubling Its Output of Covid-19 Vaccines
31.9 million Americans have already received one or both doses of a Covid-19 vaccine — including more than 9.3 million people who have been fully vaccinated. And now USA Today reports: Pfizer expects to nearly cut in half the amount of time it takes to produce a batch of COVID-19 vaccine from 110 days to an average of 60 as it…