Earth Changes
Bees pollinate numerous crops, and scientists have been expressing alarm over their falling numbers in recent years in North America. Experts warn the bee disappearance eventually could harm agriculture and the food supply.
Scientists have been struggling to understand the recent decline in various bee populations in North America. For example, a virus brought from Australia has been implicated in massive honeybee deaths last year.
Cleveland began erupting in the Aleutians Monday, sending ash nearly 17,000 feet high. Pilots are reporting surface ash 50 miles away.
The plaza at 1205 Westwood Ave., just south of Dorr Street, housed a seasonal location of the tax service franchise, H&R Block, the clothing retailer, L.A. Collections, and the yet-to-open Wings Express restaurant.
The fire at 301 Hale St. started about 3:30 a.m. after lightning hit a tree, causing the tree to split in half and fall on the house.
Before firefighters arrived, the homeowner, whose name was not immediately available, attempted to put out the blaze with an extinguisher and garden hose. It took firefighters another 20 minutes to douse the fire, which they were able to contain to an upstairs bedroom, Washington Assistant Fire Chief Randy Hurd said.
The finding does not change estimates of the oceans' total carbon uptake, but it reveals the surprisingly large role of tropical oceans and major rivers.
The tropical North Atlantic had been considered a net emitter of carbon from the respiration of ocean life. A 2007 study estimated that ocean's contribution to the atmosphere at 30 million tons of carbon annually.
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©iStockphoto |
Amazon River. |
The new study, appearing in PNAS Early Edition the week of July 21, finds that almost all the respiration is offset by organisms called diazotrophs, which pull nitrogen and carbon from the air and use them to make organic solids that sink to the ocean floor.
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©iStockphoto/Chuck Babbitt |
New research suggests there may be a workable way of reducing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere by adding lime to seawater. |
Shell is so impressed with the new approach that it is funding an investigation into its economic feasibility. 'We think it's a promising idea,' says Shell's Gilles Bertherin, a coordinator on the project. 'There are potentially huge environmental benefits from addressing climate change -- and adding calcium hydroxide to seawater will also mitigate the effects of ocean acidification, so it should have a positive impact on the marine environment.'
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©Albert Gerdes, MARUM/Bremen |
Researcher Julius Lipp, Ph.D., of Bremen University, Germany, with some of his samples. |
The authors: Kai-Uwe Hinrichs and Julius Lipp of the Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (MARUM) at University of Bremen, Germany; and Fumio Inagaki and Yuki Morono of the Kochi Institute for Core Sample Research at the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC) concluded that about 87 percent of the deep biosphere consists of Archaea.
The storm, with sustained winds of nearly 50 mph (85 kph), emerged from the Yucatan Peninsula over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. A hurricane watch was issued for the southern Texas coast, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
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©REUTERS/NOAA/Handout |
A satellite image of Tropical Storm Dolly, taken on July 21, 2008. |
Dolly was 475 miles southeast of the border, where it was due to hit on Wednesday near Brownsville, well away from sensitive offshore drilling rigs and production platforms.
The United States has largely escaped the past two Atlantic hurricane seasons, with just one hurricane -- Humberto in November 2007 -- making landfall on its coasts.