The development of a big brain in humans and its connection to social bonding has been a hot topic of debate, and secrets found in fossil teeth may hold the answers.



Researchers have been studying the fossilized teeth of an early Homo from Georgia, dating back approximately 1.77 million years. The research was made possible by the European Synchrotron in Grenoble, France.



The findings suggest that despite having a small brain and reaching adulthood at a similar pace to great apes, these early humans had a prolonged childhood. 



This could mean that the large brain of modern humans resulted from an extended childhood along with cultural transmission across generations instead of vice versa.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-long-childhood-big-brains">Long childhood, big brains</h2>



A team of researchers - including specialists from Switzerland's <a href="https://www.uzh.ch/en.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">University of Zurich</a>, the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility and Georgia's National Museum - have challenged the theory that modern humans' extended childhood is directly linked to their large brains.



The team analyzed dental development in an early Homo that was almost an adult. The results suggest that though these early humans reached adulthood at a similar age as <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/buronius-manfredschmidi-tiny-great-ape-species-lived-11-million-years-ago/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">great apes</a>, their tooth development followed a longer timeline similar to modern humans.



This proposes the distinct possibility of a longer dependency on adults and an elongated childhood for these early humans.



Remarkably, the brain size of these early Homo specimens was only marginally larger than that of a chimpanzee. This made the researchers question the link between the prolonged development and cultural transmission across generations.



An extended childhood within a three-generation context might have allowed the immature members of the group to effectively assimilate growing amounts of knowledge. 



Eventually, this led to the development of larger brains and longer life spans, traits characteristic of modern humans.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-dental-development-in-early-homo">Dental development in early Homo</h2>



An enduring assumption has been that humans' extended growth period is a consequence of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/our-brain-sizes-are-growing-possibly-lowering-dementia-risk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">increased brain volume</a> since a larger organ requires more energy resources to grow. But analysis of the fossil's dental growth has caused researchers to question this hypothesis.



The research team used synchrotron imaging to study the dental development of a near-adult fossil of early Homo from the Dmanisi site in Georgia, dated to around 1.77 million years ago. 



<div class="wp-block-sendtonews-playerselector">[sendtonews key="CWxiqQg039-4024544-12187" type="single"]</div>



“Childhood and cognition do not fossilize, so we have to rely on indirect information. Teeth are ideal because they fossilize well and produce daily rings, in the same way that trees produce annual rings, which record their development,” noted study first author Christoph Zollikofer from the University of Zurich.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-unexpected-findings-and-a-new-perspective">Unexpected findings and a new perspective</h2>



“Dental development is strongly correlated with the development of the rest of the body, including brain development," explained study co-author Paul Tafforeau, scientist at the ESRF.



"Access to the details of a <a href="https://www.earth.com/search-results/?search=fossil%20hominid&amp;start=0" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">fossil</a> hominid's dental growth therefore provides a great deal of information about its general growth."



After almost two decades of research beginning in 2005, the initial results startled researchers. 



“We expected to find either dental development typical of early hominids, close to that of the great apes, or dental development close to that of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/neanderthal-genes-still-influence-modern-humans/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">modern humans</a>," said Tafforeau.



"When we obtained the first results, we couldn’t believe what we saw, because it was something different that implied faster molar crown growth than in any other fossil hominin or living great ape."



In the following years, the team conducted five series of experiments and completed four full analyses, employing various methods as dental synchrotron imaging technology advanced.



As the consistent results suggested significant implications for the "big brain - long childhood" hypothesis, the scientists needed to think creatively to interpret this fossil's findings.



“It's been a slow maturation, both technically and intellectually, to finally arrive at the hypothesis we are publishing today,” said Tafforeau.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-longer-childhood-evolution-s-early-experiment">Longer childhood: Evolution's early experiment?</h2>



The dental development of the studied fossil suggested that milk teeth were used longer than in great apes, implying that early Homo children were dependent on adult care for a longer duration.



This could be the first experiment evolution took towards a prolonged childhood. Despite having brains only slightly larger than australopithecines or great apes, early Homo are believed to have lived longer.



The survival of a very old individual with no teeth for several years indicates that the group sufficiently cared for him. This alludes to a three-generation structure, a key aspect of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/humans-started-cumulative-culture-around-600000-years-ago/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">cultural transmission in humans</a>.



The new hypothesis begins with children's growth slowing down as cultural transmission increased. 



The accumulation of information from older to younger individuals had an advantageous effect on resource utilization and the development of complex behaviors, thus favoring a longer childhood. 



Once this mechanism was established, natural selection acted on cultural transmission, not just biological traits. 



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-big-brains-and-delayed-adulthood">Big brains and delayed adulthood</h2>



As the volume of transferrable information grew, evolution supported a larger brain and delayed adulthood, enabling a longer learning period in childhood and time to grow a bigger brain despite limited food resources.



The large brain of modern humans could be attributed to an extended childhood and a three-generation structure encouraging bio-cultural evolution. These mechanisms may have led to increased brain size, delayed adulthood, and longer lifespan. 



The study of this exceptional fossil could motivate researchers to rethink the evolutionary mechanisms that led to Homo sapiens.



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08205-2" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Nature</a>.



Image &amp; Video Credit: ESRF/Paul Tafforeau, Vincent Beyrand



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How did humans get big brains? Fossil teeth reveal new clues

The development of a big brain in humans and its connection to social bonding has been a hot topic of debate, and secrets found in fossil teeth may hold the answers. Researchers have been studying the fossilized teeth of an early Homo from Georgia, dating back approximately 1.77 million years. The research was made possible by the European Synchrotron in Grenoble, France. The findings suggest that despite having a small brain and reaching adulthood at a similar pace to great apes, these early humans had a prolonged...

The U.S. Forest Service has ripped up a portion of the Trail of Tears in the Appalachian Mountains, reopening wounds for Native Americans who consider sacred the land where thousands of their ancestors died during their forced migration westward.
The man-made trenches and berms were discovered last summer but the details about how it happened and those responsible hadn't been publicly identified. In documents obtained recently by The Associated Press, the Forest Service acknowledged that an employee approved construction along a ¾-mile section of the trail in eastern Tennessee without authorization, an embarrassing blunder for an agency that was supposed to be protecting the trail for future generations.
The $28,500 in contracting work done in 2014 involved using heavy equipment to dig three deep trenches called "tank traps" and a series of 35 berms. It was meant to keep out all-terrain vehicles and prevent erosion, but agency officials now say it was done in violation of federal laws.
Sheila Bird of the Cherokee Nation said she cried when she was asked at a meeting with Forest Service officials to talk about the impact of the damage.
"The trail is part of our history, of why we are here in Oklahoma," said Bird, who is the special projects officer for the nation's Tribal Historic Preservation Office.
The portion of the damaged trail lies near Fort Armistead, one of the stops where Cherokees were held during their forced migration West in the 1830s. This part of the trail follows the first commercial road across the mountains in that region, the Unicoi Turnpike, which in turn followed the course of an ancient Native American trail.
The Forest Service has apologized to the tribes for the damage, both physical and emotional, and is consulting with them over how to repair it. No plan has been finalized, and Forest Service spokeswoman Stephanie Johnson said the agency does not yet know what the restoration work will cost.
When the Forest Service dug up portions of the trail on the edge of the Cherokee National Forest in March and June 2014, it didn't even own the land, although it was planning to purchase it, according to Forest Service documents obtained by The Associated Press. The documents were provided to AP by the environmental group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and authenticated by the Forest Service.
The documents outline the extensive process the Forest Service employees should have gone through before doing the work but didn't.
For instance, the ranger who approved the project told another employee they didn't' have to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act because they did not own the land.
"Despite the lack of compliance with our own policies for the National Environmental Policy Act and federal laws like the ESA (Endangered Species Act), NPHA (National Historic Preservation Act), and the purchase option's requirements, the project was orally approved," the documents state.
It's not clear what, if anything, happened to the employees who ignored the law. The local ranger who gave the approval for the construction had been with Forest Service for more than 35 years before she retired in February 2015. The Forest Service said it won't discuss personnel matters.
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility executive director Jeff Ruch said that's not good enough.
"This is one the most blatant official desecrations of a sacred site in modern American history," Ruch said in a statement. "Jaw-dropping incompetence mixed with abject dereliction of duty coated in an impenetrable mantle of bureaucratic self-preservation spawned this debacle."
The group is asking the U.S. Agriculture Department for a thorough review by independent investigators and appropriate disciplinary action.
Months after the damage, Forest Service officials who were still unaware of the work extolled the pristine nature and historical significance of the parcel.
"Protecting the Trail of Tears and other significant sites in this area has been and will continue to be a priority for us," Cherokee National Forest Supervisor JaSal Morris said in an Oct. 2014 news release announcing its purchase.
Many Forest Service officials didn't realize the land had been disturbed until July 2015, when the agency hosted representatives of the Cherokee tribes and the National Parks Service to develop an interpretive plan for the trail and Fort Armistead.
Susan Abram, president of the North Carolina chapter of the Trail of Tears Association, was among a group that hiked out to the trail and discovered the damage.
"Everybody was just kind of shocked," said the Western Carolina University history professor. "This is a national historic trail ... part of our national heritage."
The trail stretches for thousands of miles through nine states. Aaron Mahr, the National Parks Service superintendent for the trail, said his agency works with private landowners and government agencies to protect the portions of the trail that cross their properties. Mahr said seeing photos of the damage done by the Forest Service left him shaking his head.
Jack Baker, National Trail of Tears Association president and a member of the Cherokee Nation Tribal Council, also learned of the destruction by seeing photos.
"I thought it was done deliberately and intentionally to destroy part of the trail. ... Other trail segments are identical and erosion is not really a concern," he said.
Marvin Harper, who lives near the trail and is president of the Coker Creek Heritage Group, took an AP reporter to see the damage Thursday. Clambering over one of the berms and dropping into a trench on the other side, only his head was visible.
"This is an embarrassment and a great loss to all of us who take pride in this part of East Tennessee," he said.
Since the destruction, Forest Service officials are halting all work within a half-mile of either side of the trail in four southern states.
Bird said she still has questions about how the damage came about, but she appreciates that the Forest Service is trying to make it right.
"They came to us with an enormous amount of humility," Bird said.
© 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

US Forest Service admits damaging the Trail of Tears

The U.S. Forest Service has ripped up a portion of...

More than 200 million gallons of contaminated waste water from a fertilizer plant in central Florida leaked into one of the state's main underground sources of drinking water after a massive sinkhole opened up beneath a storage pond, a phosphate company said Friday.
Mosaic, the world's largest supplier of phosphate, said the hole opened up beneath a pile of waste material called a "gypsum stack." The 215-million gallon storage pond sat atop the waste mineral pile. The company said the sinkhole is about 45 feet in diameter.
Mosaic says it's monitoring groundwater and has found no offsite impacts.
"Groundwater moves very slowly," said David Jellerson, Mosaic's senior director for environmental and phosphate projects. "There's absolutely nobody at risk."
The water had been used to transport the gypsum, which is a byproduct of fertilizer production, the company said.
The sinkhole, discovered by a worker on Aug. 27, is believed to reach down to the Floridan aquifer, the company said in a news release. Aquifers are vast, underground systems of porous rocks that hold water and allow water to move through the holes within the rock.
The Floridan aquifer is a major source of drinking water in the state. One of the highest producing aquifers in the world, it underlies all of Florida and extends into southern Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina.
According to the University of Florida, it's the principal source of groundwater for much of the state, and the cities of Tallahassee, Jacksonville, Gainesville, Orlando, Daytona Beach, Tampa, and St. Petersburg all rely on it. The aquifer also supplies water to thousands of domestic, industrial and irrigation wells throughout the state.
Mosaic began diverting the pond water into an alternate holding area to reduce the amount of drainage when the problem was first detected. The company said it has been "recovering the water by pumping through onsite production wells."
"We have an extensive monitoring system," Jefferson said. "It's already indicating that it's recovering the material, but it will take some time for that process to complete."
Dee Ann Miller, spokeswoman for the state's Department of Environmental Protection, said the company is updating state and federal agencies on the situation.
"Along with reviewing daily reports, DEP is performing frequent site visits to make sure timely and appropriate response continues in order to safeguard public health and the environment," Miller wrote in an email to The Associated Press. "While monitoring to date indicates that the process water is being successfully contained, groundwater monitoring will continue to ensure there are no offsite or long-term effects."
The Polk County phosphate plant is still running.
Jellerson said the water typically flows in a cycle from pond to plant to pond during the fertilizer manufacturing process.
He said the pond with the sinkhole is "now dry," and that once they recover the water that went into the deep hole, it will be reused in plant operations.
The incident comes less than a year after Mosaic, one of the world's largest fertilizer makers, settled a massive federal environmental lawsuit with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in which the company agreed to nearly $2 billion in fixes, improvements and cleanups at its plants.
Since the 1960s, toxic solid waste from fertilizer production in Florida has been growing -- some stored in 500-foot-tall piles that sometimes span more than 600 acres. Mosaic makes a common phosphorus-based fertilizer, the production of which creates polluted water and solid waste.
In 2004, during Hurricane Frances, 65 million gallons of polluted waste from a fertilizer plant was sent into waters near Tampa Bay, resulting in thousands of dead fish and other marine life.
And in 1994, another sinkhole in Polk County opened sending tons of waste from one of the company's waste piles into the earth.
EPA found that Mosaic improperly handled its facilities, which posed a threat to the environment and human health. These violations led to last year's legal settlement and the company's public commitment to become more environmentally friendly.
Environmental groups said the damage from the sinkhole could be severe, and adds to decades of pollution from the phosphorous fertilizer industry. Florida is a key center of phosphate mining.
"I wish we could say that watching an environmental tragedy unfolding at a Florida phosphate mining site was a new occurrence, but sadly it's happened repeatedly," said Tania Galloni, an attorney with the Florida office of Earthjustice. "These phosphate companies are playing roulette with our public waters."
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200 million gallons of fertilizer waste leaks into Florida drinking water

More than 200 million gallons of contaminated waste water from...

The turquoise waters became darker and darker, and squiggly glow-in-dark marine creatures began to glide past in the inky depths like ghosts.
The three-man submarine went down, down, down into the abyss and drew within sight of something no human had ever laid eyes on: Cook seamount, a 13,000-foot extinct volcano at the bottom of the sea.
Scientists aboard the vessel Pisces V visited the volcano earlier this month to examine its geological features and its rich variety of marine life, and an Associated Press reporter was given exclusive access to the dive. It was the first-ever expedition to the Cook seamount by a manned submersible.
Among other things, the researchers from the University of Hawaii and the nonprofit group Conservation International spotted such wonders as a rare type of octopus with big fins that look like Dumbo's ears, and a potentially new species of violet-hued coral they dubbed Purple Haze.
Conservation International hopes to study 50 seamounts, or undersea volcanoes, over the next five years.
"We don't know anything about the ocean floor," said Peter Seligmann, chairman, CEO and co-founder of Conservation International. "What we know is that each one of those seamounts is a refuge for new species, but we don't know what they are. We don't know how they've evolved. We don't know what lessons they have for us."


[caption id="attachment_87187" align="alignleft" width="150"]<img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-87187" src="http://www.earth.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/cook-seamount-volcano-pisces-v-vessel_1big_ap-150x150.jpg" alt="The Pisces IV submersible at the Cook seamount undersea volcano" width="150" height="150" /> The Pisces IV submersible at the Cook seamount undersea volcano[/caption]
During the Sept. 6 dive, the submarine splashed into the water, and as it dove, the only sounds were radio communications from the surface, the hum of an air scrubber that removes carbon monoxide from the passenger chamber, and the voices of the crew. The thick, hot tropical air inside the steel sphere became cooler and drier as the submarine descended.
"We don't know what we're going to find," said Conservation International's Greg Stone, a marine biologist on board. "There will always be the unexpected when you go into the deep ocean."
Halfway to the volcano's summit, which is 3,000 feet below the surface of the Pacific, no sunlight penetrated. The only light that could be seen from the submarine's face-sized windows was the bluish glow of the vessel's own bright lights. Occasionally, bioluminescent creatures drifted past in the darkness.
Stone and subpilot Terry Kerby, who helps run the Hawaii Undersea Research Laboratory at the University of Hawaii, watched as the volcano and its rugged basalt walls hundreds of yards high came into view.
Seamounts are either active or dormant volcanoes that rise dramatically from the bottom of the ocean and never reach the surface. They are hotspots for marine life because they carry nutrient-rich water upward from the sea floor. Seamounts are believed to cover about 18 million square miles of the planet.
Cook, situated over 100 miles southwest of Hawaii's Big Island, is part of a group of undersea volcanoes known as the Geologist Seamounts that are about 80 million years old and could hold many new animal species, as well as elements such as nickel and cobalt that mining companies could extract.
"My goal today is to ... find out what's living on them, find out how they support ocean life, what their effect is from ocean currents and essentially what drives the ocean, what makes the ocean what it is," Stone said. "Seamounts are a key part of that, and something which humanity knows very little about."


[caption id="attachment_87189" align="alignleft" width="150"]<img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-87189" src="http://www.earth.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/cook-seamount-volcano-undersea_2big_ap-150x150.jpg" alt="Cook seamount undersea volcano expedition" width="150" height="150" /> Cook seamount undersea volcano expedition[/caption]
Within minutes of the vessel's arrival at the summit, life began to appear - a starfish clinging to a rock, joined shortly after by eels, sharks, chimaera (also known as "ghost sharks"), shrimp, crabs and two rare Dumbo octopuses. One of the octopuses changed color from white to pink to reddish brown as it swam by.
Several types of deep-sea corals were found along the seamount's cliffs, including a vibrant purple one.
"I need to go home, look through the literature ... and also go and run some genetic analyses," said Sonia Rowley, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Hawaii who is taking part in the project. "But as this is a new seamount ... that no one had dived on before, it won't be any surprise to me whether this is going to be a new species."
Two other seamounts were studied over three days of expeditions: McCall, home to a large number of small deep-sea sharks, and Lo'ihi, an active volcano.
Lo'Ihi has been extensively surveyed by manned submersibles over the past 30 years. The past few times Kerby was there, he saw a large Pacific sleeper shark lurking about the volcano's crater.
As hot vents shot out volcanic gases around them, the team released bait in the water and the 7-foot shark appeared in front of the submarine. Kerby was delighted to see his "old friend."
The team also saw 6-foot eels and a number of new geological formations around the crater. Scientists say Lo'ihi is likely to someday become the newest island in the Hawaii chain as volcanic activity pushes the summit upward.
---
Find more stories by AP's Caleb Jones at <a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/journalist/caleb-jones.">http://bigstory.ap.org/journalist/caleb-jones.</a> Follow Jones on Twitter: <a href="https://twitter.com/CalebAP">https://twitter.com/CalebAP</a>
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Scientists visit Cook seamount undersea volcano

The turquoise waters became darker and darker, and squiggly glow-in-dark...

The sea ice cover of the Arctic Ocean and surrounding seas helps regulate the planet’s temperature, influences the circulation of the atmosphere and ocean, and impacts Arctic communities and ecosystems. Arctic sea ice shrinks every year during the spring and summer until it reaches its minimum yearly extent. Sea ice regrows during the frigid fall and winter months, when the sun is below the horizon in the Arctic.

This summer, the melt of Arctic sea ice surprised scientists by changing pace several times. The melt season began with a record low yearly maximum extent in March and a rapid ice loss through May. But in June and July, low atmospheric pressures and cloudy skies slowed down the melt. Then, after two large storms went across the Arctic basin in August, sea ice melt picked up speed through early September.

“It’s pretty remarkable that this year’s sea ice minimum extent ended up the second lowest, after how the melt progressed in June and July,” said Walt Meier, a sea ice scientist with NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. “June and July are usually key months for melt because that’s when you have 24 hours a day of sunlight – and this year we lost melt momentum during those two months.”

But in August, two very strong cyclones crossed the Arctic Ocean along the Siberian coast. These storms didn’t have as much of an immediate impact on the sea ice as the great cyclone of 2012, but in late August and early September there was “a pretty fast ice loss in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas that might be a delayed effect from the storms,” Meier said.

[caption id="attachment_87184" align="alignleft" width="150"]<img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-87184" src="http://www.earth.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/arctic-sea-ice-minimum-2016_1big_nasa-150x150.jpg" alt="Arctic sea ice minimum, 2016" width="150" height="150" /> Arctic sea ice minimum, 2016[/caption]

Meier also said that decades ago, the melt season would slow down by the middle of August, when the sun starts setting in the Arctic.

“In the past, we had this remaining sea ice pack that was mostly thick, old ice. But now everything is more jumbled up, which makes it less resistant to melt, so even late in the season you can get weather conditions that give it a final kick,” Meier said.

Arctic sea ice cover has not fared well during other months of the year either. A recently published study that ranked 37 years of monthly sea ice extents in the Arctic and Antarctic found that there has not been a record high in Arctic sea ice extents in any month since 1986. During that same time period, there have been 75 new record lows.

“When you think of the temperature records, it’s common to hear the statement that even when temperatures are increasing, you do expect a record cold here or there every once in a while,” said Claire Parkinson, main author of the study and a senior climate scientist at Goddard. “To think that in this record of Arctic sea ice that goes back to the late 1970s, since 1986 there hasn’t been a single record high in any month of the year, and yet, over that same period, there have been 75 record lows. It’s just an incredible contrast.”

“It is definitely not just September that’s losing sea ice. The record makes it clear that the ice is not rebounding to where it used to be, even in the midst of the winter,” Parkinson said.

Parkinson’s analysis, which spans from 1979 to 2015 found that in the Antarctic, where the trends are toward more rather than less sea ice, there have only been six record monthly record lows after 1986, and 45 record highs.

“The Antarctic numbers are pretty amazing, except when you compare them with the Arctic’s, which are much more amazing,” Parkinson said.

---

<a href="http://www.nasa.gov" target="_blank" rel="noopener">NASA</a>

Arctic sea ice cover hits second lowest level in history

The sea ice cover of the Arctic Ocean and surrounding...

Fishermen in New England say President Barack Obama needlessly dealt a big blow to their industry when he created the Atlantic Ocean's first marine national monument and circumvented the existing process for protecting fisheries.
The new Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument consists of nearly 5,000 square miles of underwater canyons and mountains off the New England coast. The designation will close the area to commercial fishermen, who go there primarily for lobster, red crab, squid, whiting, butterfish, swordfish and tuna.
After Thursday's announcement, fishermen pondered their next move: sue, lobby Congress to change the plan or relocate. It's hard to move, they said, because other fishermen would likely already be fishing where they would want to go.
They said the designation process wasn't transparent and the administration should have let the New England Fishery Management Council, which is charged with regulating the region's fisheries, finish working on the coral protection measures it's considering.
"There seems to be a huge misconception that there are limitless areas where displaced fishermen can go," said Grant Moore, president of the Atlantic Offshore Lobstermen's Association. "Basically with the stroke of a pen, President Obama put fishermen and their crews out of work and harmed all the shore-side businesses that support the fishing industry."
The lobstermen's association and other fishermen wanted the White House to allow fishing in depths of up to 450 meters (1,476 feet), so they could still go there but still protect deep-sea corals. Annually, about 800,000 pounds (362,877 kilograms) of lobster are caught near the canyons, according to the lobstermen's association.
White House officials said the administration listened to industry's concerns and made the monument smaller, with a seven-year transition period for the lobster and red crab industries.
Industry advocate Robert Vanasse said it's clear the plan will lead to a decrease in supply and raises prices. It's difficult to gauge the economic impact this early, added Vanasse, executive director of Saving Seafood.
A lobsterman in Newport, Rhode Island, wants Congress to act. One of Bill Palombo's three boats catches lobster exclusively in the monument area. If nothing changes within seven years, Palombo said, "I guess you just go out of business."
"What can you do?" he said. "That's why we're so upset."
Palombo and others questioned why, if the area is considered pristine and fishermen have been going there for decades, can't fishing continue?
The designation was widely praised by environmentalists as a way to sustain important species and reduce the toll of climate change.
Priscilla Brooks, of the Conservation Law Foundation, said it's a "very small area" compared to what's currently open to fishing. She said the White House struck a balance so there would be a "soft landing" for the industry, with seven years to phase out fishing.
"The fishing activities taking place in the monument aren't compatible with the protection of vulnerable marine life," she said.
Brad Sewell, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, said fishing gear has been seen on top of coral and has entangled marine mammals. He worries these problems will worsen over time as fishing gear reaches deeper.
"You want to protect an area like this is when it's relatively pristine," he said. "The time to do it is now, not wait until the damage is done."
Affected fishermen formed the Southern Georges Bank Fishing Coalition on Wednesday to oppose the monument. Coalition attorney Drew Minkiewicz said the president doesn't have the authority to use the American Antiquities Act to declare a marine monument far offshore and Congress granted the right to protect these areas to the federally mandated fisheries councils that manage them.
"For people who live and work on the water, this is terrifying," he said. "This is the government using eminent domain on your workplace."
Minkiewicz wouldn't say whether the coalition plans to sue.
The New England Fishery Management Council said it needs to reassess its management strategy given the new developments. Mary Beth Tooley, a council member from Maine, said the public process used by the council "is the way it should be done" and she's disappointed it was circumvented.
Eric Reid, general manager of a seafood processing facility in Rhode Island, knows more than 20 boats that fish in the area covered by the monument.
"If they can't get fish, I'm not in the processing business," said Reid, of Seafreeze Shoreside Inc.
Reid said Obama, who leaves office in January, will deal with the intended and unintended consequences of his decision for the rest of his term, while fishermen have to live with them forever.
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Fishermen upset over creation of Atlantic Ocean marine national monument

Fishermen in New England say President Barack Obama needlessly dealt...

The European Union has admitted Indonesia to a special licensing system it hopes will prevent the illegally felled tropical timber that makes up a substantial part of the country's wood production from being shipped to the 28-nation bloc.
The EU said Thursday that Indonesia is the first country to qualify for the licenses. It will mean that traders of goods such as wooden furniture, plywood and paper that earn the certification will find it easier to do business with Europe.
But some environmental and civil society groups are already concerned the licensing system could become a conduit for illegal timber from a country where tropical forests are being cut down at an epic rate.
The EU has been trying to implement its timber system internationally for over a decade and over the same time Indonesia has developed its own legal wood verification scheme that has become a key part of its admission to the EU's program.
"We do believe the system is credible," said Charles-Michel Geurts, deputy head of the EU mission to Indonesia, who emphasized the lengthy process to establish it reflected substantial effort in countering deep-seated problems in Indonesia's forestry industry. "But today is the start date, not the finish."
Indonesia has struggled for years to combat illegal logging that destroys the tropical forest habitat of unique animal species and deprives the government of significant revenue that could be used to improve basic services for a largely poor population of more than 250 million.
A study by the country's anti-corruption commission estimated that the commercial value of undeclared logging amounted to $60.7 billion to $81.4 billion between 2003 and 2014. The study released in October last year said official statistics on timber production capture less than a quarter of what is cut down.
Fires deliberately set by agricultural conglomerates and small-time farmers to clear forests and peatland for plantations also contribute to deforestation and are responsible for the unhealthy haze that chokes a swathe of Indonesia and neighboring countries each year.
Under the EU system, Indonesia will be able to issue the special licenses to producers using timber that it believes complies with environmental, social and economic laws. Third party certifiers issue the licenses and the overall process will be monitored by environmental groups. Indonesia will be able to issue the licenses from Nov. 15, the EU announced Thursday.
Christopher Barr, executive director of Woods &amp; Wayside International, said a "critical weakness" of Indonesia's timber verification system is that it largely focuses on administrative compliance and falls short in the area of field checks, including surprise inspections, to ensure logs are harvested from fully legal areas.
The system was designed to audit timber from selective forestry concessions but in the past decade increased volumes of wood have been produced through the clearing of forests for palm oil and pulpwood plantations and other uses, he said.
<img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-87168" src="http://www.earth.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/deforestation-tropical-rainforest_1big_stock-150x150.jpg" alt="deforestation-tropical-rainforest_1big_stock" width="150" height="150" />Lafcadio Cortesi, Asia director of the Rainforest Action Network, said it may be premature for the EU to create a "green lane" that expedites the export of Indonesian timber and timber products.
Deforestation in Indonesia often goes hand in hand with human rights violations such as companies grabbing the traditional lands of communities, he said.
The scale of illegal and unreported logging in Indonesia could be beyond the scope of civil society groups and others to effectively monitor and when violations are identified, the process for dealing with them is cumbersome and lengthy, he said.
"There is not adequate capacity in the system," said Cortesi. "The government has had to contract out auditing."
Earlier this month, a palm oil company held captive seven officials from the Ministry of Environment and Forestry who had visited its plantation as part of an investigation into forest fires.
Mardi Minangsari from the Independent Forest Monitoring Network, which is involved in checking companies' compliance with legal timber requirements, said the system is not perfect but can be refined and improved.
The environment and forestry ministry has demonstrated its commitment to reform with more than a decade of effort to tackle the illegal timber crisis, she said.
A potential loophole stems from the wood furniture industry in Java, which comprises many small-scale producers who use wood from private forests that can be as small as a hectare or two, and get less scrutiny. Larger companies could abuse that by representing products as coming from small producers, Minangsari said.
"Implementation is the biggest challenge," she said. "If the government is not really hands on, they can blame the third party certifiers" for any failures.
Europe is already an important market for Indonesian wood, buying about a third of its tropical timber shipments and more than a tenth of its paper and other timber products.
A study in the journal Nature Climate Change estimated that by 2012, Indonesia was clearing 840,000 hectares of forests a year, more than any other country.
In 2014, it renewed a moratorium on new licenses for logging in virgin forests but deforestation has continued largely unabated.
---
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European Union works to save tropical timber in Indonesia

The European Union has admitted Indonesia to a special licensing...

The world’s population is expected to soar by 2.5 billion people by 2050, bringing a host of global challenges – including how to feed so many hungry mouths.

If projections hold, the global demand for animal protein will double over the next four decades, rising along with pressure to find ecologically sustainable food production practices.

Could farmed fish save the day? Just maybe, says UC Santa Barbara’s Steve Gaines. He and his team looked at wild-caught fish, farmed fish and land-based farming to assess the most viable long-term options.

The surprise: Fish farming floated above the rest for ecologic and economic reasons.

But there’s one big catch: Aquaculture has gotten a bad rap with American consumers.

“I meet people all the time who say, ‘I will only eat wild fish because aquaculture is bad,’” said Gaines, dean of the Bren School of Environmental Science &amp; Management at UC Santa Barbara.

Gaines has been working to change minds about aquaculture, speaking at conferences around the country like this week’s Monterey Bay Aquarium Sustainable Foods Institute.

While some forms of aquaculture can harm the environment, others have a much lower impact, especially when compared to raising livestock – and in some cases even compare favorably to an entirely vegetarian diet, he said.

“The analysis shocked us. It completely changed my perspective,” Gaines said. “There are some really bad ways to do aquaculture, but if you look at best practices, they are dramatically better than any production on land. In many cases, it’s 50 to 100 times higher environmental impact to produce on land than in the ocean.”

Limits of wild fish

As part of UC’s Global Food Initiative, Gaines and his team analyzed global fish stocks. They found that increasing the productivity of wild-caught fish would only meet 5 to 10 percent of global demand.

They compared land-based options such as goats and sheep and were floored to find that feeding the 2050 world population would require converting the equivalent of 75 percent of South America into new food production. When they penciled the numbers, aquaculture surprisingly surfaced to the top.

The life-cycle assessment took into account such things as the area used for food production and the cost of feed and fuel and how they impact greenhouse gases.

The lowest environmental impact came from unfed aquaculture such as clams, mussels, oysters and seaweed, which can grow without being fed fish meal.

Farmed salmon, trout and other fish that require feeding have a higher environmental impact, Gaines said, but that impact will likely be reduced in coming years as researchers find better ways to feed fish, including developing food from bacteria and yeast.

“We should be encouraging the best sustainable practices in aquaculture,” Gaines said.

Aquaculture rising

Currently, meat is the largest source of animal protein consumed globally, accounting for more than two-thirds of the total. Fish consumption has increased since 1980, and the mix of farmed versus wild-caught fish also has changed. Aquaculture now accounts for nearly half of all seafood, up from just 10 percent in 1980. By 2030, aquaculture is projected to provide close to two-thirds of global fish consumption, with Asia accounting for the bulk of that. The fastest growing types of farmed fish are expected to be tilapia, carp and catfish.

“There’s not enough wild fish to feed us all,” said Ryan Bigelow, program engagement manager for the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch, which helps consumers and businesses choose seafood that’s caught or farmed sustainably. “There’s no scenario where aquaculture is not part of our food future. If we’re going to do it, we should do it well. There are good options out there.”

Scaling up solutions

To prepare for the shift, UC Santa Barbara’s Sustainable Aquaculture Research Center is helping to develop environmentally sound solutions for fish farming around the world, and looking at the policy shifts that could support it.

In California, the center is working with fish farmers and legislators to advance offshore and onshore marine aquaculture, with the goal of identifying best practices and minimizing environmental impacts.

In Mexico, the center is collaborating with others to assess the feasibility of enhancing populations of the totoaba (large sea bass) and Catarina scallop through aquaculture.

The center also is working with UC San Diego researchers to compare the ecological and human health effects of different aquaculture habitats (offshore, coastal, land-based) and what this might mean for the development and regulation of aquaculture in California and globally.

Meanwhile, Gaines and his colleagues aren’t ignoring wild fisheries. Indeed, UC Santa Barbara is partnering with others to preserve the sustainable health of fisheries from Maine to Mozambique.

A UC Santa Barbara-Columbia University study found that factoring in climate variability may enable fishery managers to protect New England cod stocks from future collapse.

In another example, UC Santa Barbara is partnering with the Environmental Defense Fund and Rare on Fish Forever, which is empowering small-scale fishers in coastal communities of Belize, Brazil, Indonesia, Mozambique and the Philippines to sustainably manage their fisheries.

“Find out what works and scale that,” Gaines said. “If you fix fisheries, you catch more fish and you make more money.”

---

<a href="http://universityofcalifornia.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">University of California</a>

Can farmed fish solve the world's food problem?

The world’s population is expected to soar by 2.5 billion...

President Barack Obama said Thursday that creating the Atlantic Ocean's first marine national monument was a needed response to dangerous climate change, ocean dead zones and unsustainable fishing practices.
The new Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument consists of nearly 5,000 square miles of underwater canyons and mountains off the New England coast. It's the 27th time that Obama has created or enlarged a national monument.
"If we're going to leave our children with oceans like the ones that were left to us, then we're going to have to act and we're going to have to act boldly," Obama said at a State Department conference. More than 20 countries represented at the meeting were also announcing the creation of their own marine protected areas.
Monument designations come with restrictions on certain activities. The White House said the designation will lead to a ban on commercial fishing, mining and drilling, though a seven-year exception will occur for the lobster and red crab industries. Recreational fishing will be allowed within the monument.
Supporters of the new monument say protecting large swaths of ocean from human stresses can sustain important species and reduce the toll of climate change. Fishermen worry it will become harder for them to earn a living as a result of Obama's move.
"We've been fishing out there for 35 years. It's a big blow to us," said Jon Williams, president of the Atlantic Red Crab Company in New Bedford, Massachusetts.
White House officials said the administration listened to industry's concerns, and noted the monument is smaller than originally proposed and contains a transition period for companies like Williams'.
Williams said his company will survive, but the changes designed to address some of his concerns don't sway him about the merits of the monument.
"I think the entire New England fishery is upside down over this," Williams said.
Obama said the world was asking too much of its oceans. He said the investments the U.S. and other nations were taking with new marine protected areas were vital for their economy and national security, but "also vital to our spirit."
"We cannot truly protect our planet without protecting our oceans," Obama said.
In all, the Atlantic Ocean monument will include three underwater canyons deeper than the Grand Canyon and four underwater mountains. It is home to such protected species as the sperm, fin and sei whales, and Kemp's ridley turtles. Expeditions also have found species of coral found nowhere else on earth.
Environmental groups pushed the effort to designate the new monument and sought to make the case it was as important to be good stewards of the ocean as it was the land and air.
"Just as wild lands around the globe are beleaguered by human development and climate change, our oceans are under duress today more than ever before," said Jamie Williams, president of The Wilderness Society.
---
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Obama: Oceans are key to protecting Earth from climate change

President Barack Obama said Thursday that creating the Atlantic Ocean's...

In the Earth's oceans these days, the bigger a species is, the more prone it is to die off. That's unheard of in the long history of mass extinctions, a new study finds.
As subfamilies of marine animal species - called genera - grow larger in body size, the likelihood of them being classified as threatened with extinction increases by an even greater amount, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/">Science</a> . In past extinctions, smaller creatures were more prone to die off, or size didn't matter, said study lead author Jonathan Payne, a paleobiologist at Stanford University.
Almost none of the genera that have species averaging 0.4 inches (1 centimeter) long are threatened with extinction, But 23 percent of those that are 3.9 inches (10 centimeters) are threatened, 40 percent of those that are 39 inches (1 meter) are endangered and 86 percent of those that are 32.8 feet (10 meters) are vulnerable, Payne said.
These are species that are not extinct yet, but are on the respected Red Listof threatened and endangered species created by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.
"The proportion of species that are threatened increases enormously as body size increases," Payne said.
Take the blue whale , not only the largest living animal, stretching close to 100 feet long, but the largest to ever have existed, Payne said. It's on the IUCN endangered list and has lost as much as 90 percent of its population in the last three generations, according to the IUCN.
On the other end of the spectrum is a grouping of fish, bioluminescent bristlemouths , that are about three inches long. They are the most abundant creatures with a backbone; the population is estimated to be in the trillions.
Payne compared fossil records, looked at past mass extinctions and compared them to current threats, concentrating on 264 genera that have the best modern and ancient records. Payne concentrated on oceans, where the fossil records are better over time. The mass extinction 65 million years ago that killed off the dinosaurs didn't kill off bigger marine species at higher rates than smaller ones, unlike what's happening now, Payne said.
The study "shows us how unusual this crisis of biodiversity we have right now," said Boris Worm, a top marine scientist at Dalhousie University in Canada. He wasn't part of the study but praised it. "We have had mass extinctions before. This one is totally different than what has happened before."
Worm spoke from a break during research in Canada's Bay of Fundy, where after a more-than-20-year career he finally saw his first underwater right whale and basking shark .
"They are both in trouble and both among the largest of their kind," Worm said.
Payne's study didn't try to explain why larger animals were more threatened, but both he and Worm point to one main suspect: humans. Mostly through fishing and hunting, but also through environmental degradation such as warmer and more acidic oceans, humans have made it tougher for the biggest marine animals to survive, they said.
Catherine Novelli, the U.S. undersecretary of state for environment, said a world oceans conference that starts Thursday in Washington, will see the announcement of "many more" areas where nations set aside large areas of the seas where animals are protected and fishing is prohibited.
Duke University biologist Stuart Pimm also praised the study as both compelling and disturbing because "even if some species do hang on, we have massively changed the ecology of much of the oceans."
Payne said there is still hope, since these species haven't gone extinct yet. He points to northern elephant seals which had a population below 100 in the early 1910s, but are now more than 100,000 strong. But they are the exception.
"It pains you to the core to know that these animals might be gone in a generation or two," Worm said. "You can't imagine a world without them. It's such an important and beautiful part of our planet."
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Online:
Science: <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/">http://www.sciencemag.org</a>
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Bigger species are more threatened in Earth's oceans

In the Earth's oceans these days, the bigger a species...

Most Americans are willing to pay a little more each month to fight global warming - but only a tiny bit, according to a new poll. Still, environmental policy experts hail that as a hopeful sign.
Seventy-one percent want the federal government to do something about global warming, including 6 percent who think the government should act even though they are not sure that climate change is happening, according to a poll conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago.
And those polled said they'd be willing to foot a little of that cost in higher electric bills.
If the cost of fighting climate change is only an additional $1 a month, 57 percent of Americans said they would support that. But as that fee goes up, support for it plummets. At $10 a month, 39 percent were in favor and 61 percent opposed. At $20 a month, the public is more than 2-to-1 against it. And only 1-in-5 would support $50 a month.
"I feel we need to make small sacrifices - and money is a small sacrifice - to make life better for future generations, " said Sarah Griffin, a 63-year-old retired teacher in central Pennsylvania. "Surely I have enough money to spend on something that's worthwhile."
Greg Davis, a 27-year-old post-graduate student in Columbus, Ohio, agreed: "It's far more important to protect the environment than to save money. I think that's true for businesses as well as individuals."
That a majority is willing to pay more is a new phenomenon, said Tom Dietz, professor of sociology and environmental science and policy at Michigan State University.
"While the amounts may seem small, the willingness to take action, even if there are some out-of-pocket costs, is encouraging," Dietz said in an email.
Dana Fisher, director of the Program for Society and the Environment at the University of Maryland, said it's noteworthy that a majority was "willing to pay at all," and added that the levels of support for $10 a month and $20 a month are significant.
But so was the opposition to higher costs.
James Osadzinski, 52 of Rockford, Illinois, said simply: "I have a set budget. I don't have the money," while for 26-year-old nurse Marina Shertzer of Pensacola, Florida, it doesn't make sense because she doesn't see climate change as a threat, but something cyclical and normal.
Of those polled, 77 percent said climate change is happening, 13 percent weren't sure, and only 10 percent said it wasn't happening.
There remains a partisan divide in how Americans view climate change. While 84 percent of Democrats and 55 percent of independents view global warming as a fact and a problem that the government needs to address, only 43 percent for Republicans agree. And 18 percent of Republicans said they think climate change is happening but don't think the government should address the issue.
Slightly more than half of Americans - 54 percent - said they approved of Obama administration rules to cut pollution from coal power plants, the biggest emitter of heat-trapping carbon dioxide. When the question also mentions that thousands of jobs may be eliminated while reducing coal use by one-third, only 45 percent favor the policy; 29 percent are opposed.
Last December, 190 nations in the world signed an agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Two-thirds of those polled were at least moderately confident that the United States could meet its obligations. But about the same number of Americans weren't that sure that China - the No. 1 polluter - and India could meet their goals.
Davis, the Ohio student, wasn't very optimistic about the future
"I think as the younger generation starts displacing the older people, I think we'll get somewhere," he said. "But I'm afraid that may be too late."
The AP-NORC poll of 1,096 adults was conducted Aug. 11-14 using a sample drawn from NORC's probability-based AmeriSpeak panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 3.6 percentage points.
The survey was paid for by the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago.
Respondents were first selected randomly using address-based sampling methods, and later interviewed online or by phone.
---
AP Polling Editor Emily Swanson contributed to this report.
---
Online:
AP-NORC Center: <a href="http://www.apnorc.org/">http://www.apnorc.org/</a>
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Poll: Americans will tolerate higher bills to fight global warming

Most Americans are willing to pay a little more each...

Polar bears are among the animals most affected by the seasonal and year-to-year decline in Arctic sea ice extent, because they rely on sea ice for essential activities such as hunting, traveling and breeding.

A new study by University of Washington researchers, funded by NASA and using satellite data from NASA and other agencies, found a trend toward earlier sea ice melt in the spring and later ice growth in the fall across all 19 polar bear subpopulations, which can negatively impact the feeding and breeding capabilities of the bears. The paper, published on Sept. 14 in the journal The Cryosphere, is the first to quantify the sea ice changes in each polar bear subpopulation across the entire Arctic region using metrics that are specifically relevant to polar bear biology.

"This study shows declining sea ice for all subpopulations of polar bears," said co-author Harry Stern, a researcher with the University of Washington's Polar Science Center in Seattle.

The analysis shows that the critical timing of the sea ice break-up and sea ice freeze-up is changing in all areas in a direction that is harmful for polar bears.

“Other researchers have used the satellite-derived sea ice data to look at how the sea ice extent in a particular place is changing in a particular month. But for us the important thing was the timing of the retreat of sea ice in the spring and its advance in the fall, for all 19 polar bear subpopulations,” Stern said.

Nineteen separate polar bear subpopulations live throughout the Arctic, spending their winters and springs roaming on sea ice and hunting. The bears have evolved mainly to eat seals, which provide necessary fats and nutrients in the harsh Arctic environment. Polar bears can't outswim their prey, so instead they perch on the ice as a platform and ambush seals at breathing holes or break through the ice to access their dens.

"Sea ice really is their platform for life," said co-author Kristin Laidre, a researcher at the UW's Polar Science Center. "They are capable of existing on land for part of the year, but the sea ice is where they obtain their main prey."

[caption id="attachment_87150" align="alignleft" width="150"]<img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-87150" src="http://www.earth.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/sea-ice-melt-polar-bears_1big_nasa-150x150.jpg" alt="Three adult polar bears travel across sea ice in southeast Greenland." width="150" height="150" /> Three adult polar bears travel across sea ice in southeast Greenland.[/caption]

The new study draws upon 35 years of satellite data showing sea ice concentration each day in the Arctic. NASA scientists process the data, stored at the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.

The center also reports each fall the yearly minimum low for Arctic sea ice. This August saw the fourth lowest in the satellite record and the September minimum extent is likely headed to its second lowest level in the record.

In 17 of the 19 polar bear subpopulations, the researchers found that the total number of ice-covered days declined at the rate of seven to 19 days per decade between 1979 and 2014. The decline was even greater in the Barents Sea and the Arctic basin. Sea ice concentration during the summer months — an important measure because summertime is when some subpopulations are forced to fast on land — also declined in all regions, by 1 percent to 9 percent per decade.

The most striking result, researchers said, is the consistent trend across all polar bear regions for an earlier spring ice melt and a later fall freeze-up. Arctic sea ice retreats in the springtime as daylight reappears and temperatures warm. In the fall months the ice sheets build again as temperatures drop.

"These spring and fall transitions bound the period when there is good ice habitat available for bears to feed," Laidre said. "Those periods are also tied to the breeding season when bears find mates, and when females come out of their maternity dens with very small cubs and haven't eaten for months."

The researchers found that on average, spring melting was three to nine days earlier per decade, and fall freeze-up was three to nine days later per decade. Over the 35 years of Arctic sea ice satellite data. that corresponds to a roughly 3-and-a-half-week shift at either end — and seven weeks of total loss of good sea ice habitat for polar bears.

"We expect that if the trends continue, compared with today, polar bears will experience another six to seven weeks of ice-free periods by mid-century," Stern said.

The trend appears to be linear and isn't accelerating or leveling off, Stern added.

The study's results currently are used by the Polar Bear Specialist Group, part of the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Species Survival Commission. . The Polar Bear Specialist Group used the sea ice metric as a measure of polar bear habitat in the IUCN Red List assessment of polar bears, which assesses the conservation status of polar bears. The researchers plan to update their findings each year as new ice coverage data are available.

"It's nice to see this work being used in high-level conservation goals," Laidre said.

“This NASA-funded work is an excellent example of the use satellite imagery to understand the distribution and abundance of an Arctic keystone species, with the added benefit of providing vital information to those charged with managing polar bear populations globally,” said Woody Turner, the Program Scientist for Biological Diversity and Program Manager for Ecological Forecasting in the NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.

The study was funded by NASA and the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources.

---

<a href="http://www.nasa.gov" target="_blank" rel="noopener">NASA</a>

Polar bears are facing shorter sea ice season

Polar bears are among the animals most affected by the...

A NASA airborne mission designed to transform our understanding of Earth's valuable and ecologically sensitive coral reefs has set up shop in Australia for a two-month investigation of the Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest reef ecosystem.

At a media briefing today at Cairns Airport in North Queensland, Australia, scientists from NASA's COral Reef Airborne Laboratory (CORAL) mission and their Australian collaborators discussed the mission's objectives and the new insights they expect to glean into the present condition of the Great Barrier Reef and the function of reef systems worldwide.

"CORAL offers the clearest, most extensive picture to date of the condition of a large portion of the world's coral reefs," said CORAL Principal Investigator Eric Hochberg of the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences (BIOS), Ferry Reach, St. George's, Bermuda, prior to the briefing. "This new understanding of reef condition and function will allow scientists to better predict the future of this global ecosystem and provide policymakers with better information for decisions regarding resource management."

CORAL's three-year mission combines aerial surveys using state-of-the-art airborne imaging spectrometer technology developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, with in-water validation activities. The mission will provide critical data and new models for analyzing reef ecosystems from a new perspective. CORAL will generate a uniform data set for a large sample of reefs across the Pacific Ocean. Scientists can use these data to search for trends between coral reef condition and the natural and human-produced biological and environmental factors that affect reefs.

Over the next year, CORAL will survey portions of the Great Barrier Reef, along with reef systems in the main Hawaiian Islands, the Mariana Islands and Palau.

In Australia, CORAL mission will survey six discrete sections across the length of the Great Barrier Reef, from the Capricorn-Bunker Group in the south to Torres Strait in the north. Two locations on the reef -- one north (Lizard Island Research Station) and one south (Heron Island Research Station) -- will serve as bases for in-water validation activities. Scientists from Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and the University of Queensland in Brisbane are collaborating with NASA and BIOS to conduct additional complementary in-water validation activities.

The Great Barrier Reef: Australia's National Treasure

Located in the Coral Sea off Queensland, the Great Barrier Reef encompasses more than 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands. It is more than 1,400 miles (2,300 kilometers) long and covers an area of about 133,000 square miles (344,400 square kilometers). The largest single structure made by living organisms on Earth, the reef teems with biodiversity, including about 400 species of coral. It attracts about 2 million visitors a year; in turn, tourism and fishing generate billions annually and employ tens of thousands of people. However, the reef faces environmental pressures from various human and climate change impacts.

"The Great Barrier Reef is Australia's national treasure, so having a broader understanding of its condition and what's threatening it will help us better understand how we can protect it," said Tim Malthus, research leader of CSIRO's Coastal Monitoring, Modeling and Informatics Group in Canberra, Australia. "Along with surveying several large sections of the reef, CORAL will also survey the health of corals in the Torres Strait, a complex high-tide area that has been historically less studied. It is also opportunistic for us to see if the reef is recovering after the recent bleaching event."

Stuart Phinn, professor of geography at the University of Queensland (UQ), said CORAL will provide Australian coral reef science and management with unique new maps and mapping approaches. These will expand ongoing efforts to map and understand Great Barrier Reef dynamics. "Being able to support and collaborate on NASA's CORAL project will enable groups like ours to advance our capabilities and transfer them to Australian science and management agencies," Phinn said. "Part of this includes building a process for mapping the entire reef. UQ and CORAL will exchange field data, knowledge and experience to cross-validate mapping and monitoring approaches."

An Urgent Need for Better Data

Around the world, concerns among scientists, resource managers and the public that coral reef ecosystems are degrading at alarming rates due to human-induced factors and global change have motivated increased assessment and monitoring efforts. The urgency of the problem has forced estimates of global reef status to be synthesized from a variety of local surveys with disparate aims, methods and quality.

The problem with current assessments of reef degradation, said Hochberg, is that the data supporting these predictions are not uniform and surprisingly sparse. "Virtually all reef assessments to date rely on in-water survey techniques that are laborious, expensive and limited in spatial scope," he said. "Very little of Earth's reef area has been directly surveyed. More importantly, there are no existing models that quantitatively relate reef conditions to the full range of biological and environmental factors that affect them -- models that can help scientists better understand how coral reefs will respond to expected environmental changes. CORAL addresses an urgent need in the face of ongoing worldwide reef degradation, and also serves as a pathfinder for a future satellite mission to globally survey the world's reefs."

Natural, balanced coral reefs comprise mosaics of coral, algae and sand on the seafloor that, together, drive the structure and function of reef ecosystems. When corals die, algae rapidly take over their skeletons. A non-stressed, healthy reef will usually increase coral coverage as it recovers from disturbance. But when a stressed reef is disturbed, the carbonate structure of its coral erodes, and the reef ultimately becomes a flat-bottom community dominated by algae, shifting rubble and sand, with little to no coral recovery. Such ecosystem phase shifts, as they are called, represent a radical change in a reef's character, marked by a decline in the diversity of reef flora and fauna.

CORAL will generate scientific data products describing coral reef condition, measuring three key components of reef health for which we currently have limited data: composition, primary productivity and calcification. Primary productivity is a measure of how much energy is available to drive biological activity in a reef system. Calcification measures the net gain in carbonates, which determine a reef's long-term growth.

PRISM: Shining New Light on Coral Reef Condition

To accomplish its science objectives, CORAL will use JPL's Portable Remote Imaging Spectrometer (PRISM). PRISM will literally peer through the ocean's surface to generate high-resolution images of reflected light in the specific regions of the electromagnetic spectrum important to coral reef scientists. Mounted in the belly of a modified Tempus Solutions Gulfstream IV aircraft, PRISM will survey reefs from an altitude of 28,000 feet (8,500 meters) to generate calibrated scientific data products.

"PRISM builds on an extensive legacy of JPL spectrometers that have successfully operated for NASA and non-NASA missions," said Michelle Gierach, NASA CORAL project scientist at JPL. "It provides the coral reef science community with high-quality oceanographic imagery at the accuracy, range, resolution, signal-to-noise ratio, sensitivity and uniformity needed to answer key questions about coral reef condition. PRISM data will be analyzed against data for 10 key biological and environmental factors affecting coral reef ecosystems, acquired from pre-existing data sources."

NASA collects data from space, air, land and sea to increase our understanding of our home planet, improve lives and safeguard our future. NASA develops new ways to observe and study Earth's interconnected natural systems with long-term data records. The agency freely shares this unique knowledge and works with institutions around the world to gain new insights into how our planet is changing.

For more information about NASA's Earth science activities, visit:

<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/earth">http://www.nasa.gov/earth</a>

NASA's CORAL mission begins study of the Great Barrier Reef

A NASA airborne mission designed to transform our understanding of...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Nushagak Bay, a large estuary in southwest Alaska. Nushagak runs mainly north to south and exits in Bristol Bay, a large body of water in the Bering Sea.



"The bay is primarily fed by the Nushagak River, which begins in the Alaska Range and flows southwest approximately 450 km. The bay is also fed by several additional rivers including the Wood, Igushik, Snake and Weary rivers," says ESA.



"The dark colors of the Nushagak River are most likely due to tannins or lignins (chemical substances found in plants). Tannins and lignins from roots, leaves, seeds, bark and soil can leach into the water and give it a brown or even black colour. The sediments then flow southwards where it is mixed with the bluer waters of the bay."



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Nushagak Bay in southwest Alaska

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> (ACS) reveals that proteins on flu viruses are actually flexible, tilting and waving in a “breath-like” motion. According to the experts, these proteins could be used to better defend against the flu.



"The main antigenic targets of influenza virus are two surface glycoproteins, hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA). Whereas the structural and dynamical properties of both glycoproteins have been studied previously, the understanding of their plasticity in the whole-virion context is fragmented," wrote the researchers.



To investigate, the team conducted detailed simulations of the influenza A H1N1 virion, or the swine flu. The experts concluded that the visualizations show many new vulnerable states of flu viruses, which could improve future vaccines and antiviral drugs.



Video/ Image Credit: American Chemical Society&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Flu viruses are more flexible than expected

[sendtonews key="G9bUoxcjr4-2511624-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Lake Trasimeno, which is located west of Perugia in central Italy. It is the fourth largest lake in the country. While Trasimeno’s water level varies, it has a maximum depth of approximately six meters.&nbsp;



"In this Copernicus Sentinel-2 image, captured on 6 August 2022, the lake’s emerald green colour is likely due to the presence of phytoplankton. Streaks in the water, particularly visible in the west, indicate the presence of soil and sediments which have been stirred up by winds. Dark colored waters in the southern part of the lake indicate a presence of submerged and floating macrophytes (aquatic plants) as well as algae," says ESA.



"Surrounded by hills on three sides, Trasimeno is subject to heavy storms created by winds, especially from the north and west. There are three islets in the lake: Maggiore, Minore and Polvese (the largest). The lake’s shores are sparsely inhabited with only two popular villages: Castiglione del Lago and Passignano sul Trasimeno."



"Italy is experiencing its worst drought in 70 years which has affected drinking water supplies, hydroelectric power and agricultural production. High temperatures, hot winds and lack of rainfall are the main causes of drought in the Umbrian region which saw Lake Trasimeno’s drop 1.3 m, reaching the limit of the hydrometric zero in July 2022."



Video/Image Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Lake Trasimeno in Central Italy

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> describes a new self-powered nanosensor that can instantly detect mercury contamination with the tap of a finger.&nbsp;



The oxidized form of mercury can be harmful when it is ingested through contaminated water or food. This makes it necessary for experts to develop sensors that can quickly and accurately detect the presence of mercury.&nbsp;



Zong-Hong Lin and colleagues have now created a triboelectric nanosensor (TENS) that can detect mercury by simply by touching a sample. According to the researchers, their TENS could serve as the basis for similar devices to safely and remotely monitor other pollutants.



Video Credit: American Chemical Society&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Detecting mercury contamination with the tap of a finger

[sendtonews key="LvS8v8bp9z-2564889-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Kainji Lake, a reservoir on the Niger River.



In 1968, Kainji Lake was created by the construction of the Kainji Dam. The Niger River, the third longest in Africa, enters the lake in the north.&nbsp;



According to <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/rivers-in-the-american-west-are-a-lifesaving-resource-for-birds/">ESA</a>, the creation of the lake submerged Foge Island and the town of Bussa and permanently flooded other riverine settlements, leaving around 50,000 people displaced.&nbsp;



Large parts of Foge Island are temporarily exposed during low water tides, and the land is often used by migrating fishermen. Kainji Dam is a dam across the Niger River in Niger State of Central Nigeria. 



Wild mammals occur at relatively low densities due to illegal hunting. Lake Kainji has suffered a dramatic decline as a fishery due to the high numbers of artisanal and subsistence fisherfolk using the lake. It has been suggested that a period of closure, together with controlled fishing rights may help improve fish stocks.



Kainji Lake National Park is the oldest of its kind in Nigeria. The park contains three distinct areas: a part of the Kainji Lake, the Borgu Game Reserve to the west of the lake, and the Zugurma Game Reserve to the southeast. The park is home to around 65 mammal species, 350 bird species, and 30 species of reptiles and amphibians. 



Video/ Image Credit: European Space Agency&nbsp;



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Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Kainji Lake in north central Nigeria

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.igb.illinois.edu/">Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology</a> reveals how scientists can modify common crops like soybean, rice, and wheat to protect them from heat stress.



“We need to double crop production by 2050 to feed a growing global population, and not only are we not on track to do that, but climate change is further complicating things,” said Amanda Cavanagh, a lecturer at the University of Essex. 



The study is part of Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE), an international research project that aims to develop food crops that turn the sun’s energy into food more efficiently.



“Using an engineering approach we designed multiple alternative metabolic pathways to photorespiration. Testing them in the field showed increases in productivity which led Amanda to significantly move the project forward by showing our engineered plants can withstand pretty extreme temperature stress,” said study co-author and RIPE researcher Paul South.&nbsp;



“As the climate changes and temperature stresses increase the pressure on our global food supply, farmers will need every tool available including engineering approaches like the synthetic biology used here to maintain safe and productive harvests.”



The experts tested plants modified to have more efficient photorespiration to see if they were better adapted to warmer temperatures.&nbsp;



The team found that the engineered plants produced 26 percent more biomass than the wild-type plants exposed to the same temperatures, and had 15 percent less yield loss under the higher temperatures.



Video Credit: Amanda Nguyen/University of Illinois



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Designing crops that can beat the heat

[sendtonews key="QGPzYnXEtN-1712599-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from Carl...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> explores the ability of salt to transform the way that foods and beverages taste. Salt is known to cover up undesirable flavors, such as bitterness in coffee or beer, but how exactly does sodium chloride change the taste of other compounds?



One previous study showed that, not only does salt suppress bitterness, but also enhances sweetness and sourness. Another study revealed that bitterness reduction by salt seems to be happening at the tongue receptor level as well as in the brain.&nbsp;



While it is known that salt taste is mediated by the presence of sodium channels in the form of taste buds, experts believe that there is also an unknown receptor responsible for how we taste salt that has not yet been identified.&nbsp;



Video Credit: ACS Reactions



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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How does salt makes things taste better?

[sendtonews key="X0f6OHYoI4-2310561-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Santiago, the capital city of Chile. The city is located in the center of the Santiago Metropolitan Region, which has a population of about eight million people.&nbsp;



'The weather of Santiago resembles the Mediterranean climate with dry and warm summers with temperatures reaching up to 35°C (from October to March) and cool and humid winters that can drop to 0°C (from April to September)."



"The city lies in the centre of the country’s central valley around 80 km from the Pacific Ocean to the west and borders Argentina to the east. A tiny part of Argentina is visible in the top-right corner of the image where the mountain crest of the Andes Mountains acts as a divider between the two countries," says ESA.



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Santiago, Chile in South America

[sendtonews key="JRaP49ISmm-2357509-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

Spiral,Galaxy,,Illustration,Of,Milky,Way

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Astronomers at <a href="https://www.jhu.edu/">Johns Hopkins University</a> have created an interactive map of the universe, including the actual position and real colors of 200,000 galaxies. The map allows the public to access data that was previously only available to scientists.



The map was developed using data collected by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. For over two decades, a telescope in New Mexico was aimed at slightly different locations to capture the night sky.&nbsp;



"Growing up I was very inspired by astronomy pictures, stars, nebulae and galaxies, and now it's our time to create a new type of picture to inspire people," said map creator Brice Ménard, a professor at Johns Hopkins. "Astrophysicists around the world have been analyzing this data for years, leading to thousands of scientific papers and discoveries. But nobody took the time to create a map that is beautiful, scientifically accurate, and accessible to people who are not scientists. Our goal here is to show everybody what the universe really looks like."



"In this map, we are just a speck at the very bottom, just one pixel. And when I say we, I mean our galaxy, the Milky Way which has billions of stars and planets. We are used to seeing astronomical pictures showing one galaxy here, one galaxy there or perhaps a group of galaxies. But what this map shows is a very, very different scale."



"From this speck at the bottom, we are able to map out galaxies across the entire universe, and that says something about the power of science."



The <a href="https://mapoftheuniverse.net/">interactive map</a> is available online, where it can be downloaded for free.



Video Credit: Johns Hopkins&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Interactive map of the universe includes 200,000 galaxies

[sendtonews key="e4ZG0Jawp3-2374785-12187" type="single"] Astronomers at Johns Hopkins University have created...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes the first comprehensive estimate of carbon density in the Saharan, Sahel, and Sudanian zones of Africa. In an effort to measure the amount of carbon stored across these drylands, a team of scientists used high-resolution satellite images and artificial intelligence to map nearly 10 billion individual trees. 



"The high spatial resolution (50 cm) combined with AI and field measurements used in this study is key to improving tree inventories in drylands," said Pierre Hiernaux, a French researcher working for NASA. "The ever-increasing availability of very high-resolution satellite imagery will make it possible to assess carbon pools and their dynamics at the individual tree level on a global scale."



"This study is exceptional because it is pioneering a type of approach that will revolutionize the monitoring of trees and forests on a global scale: in the short term, it will be possible to map the world's trees from the centre of the Amazon to our schoolyards," said <a href="https://www.inrae.fr/en">INRAE</a> researcher Jean-Pierre Wigneron.



"Many fields of application will become much more efficient and accurate, such as tracking carbon stocks, biodiversity, monitoring logging and protection against illegal forest degradation, in near real time.”



Video Credit: NASA Goddard&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Remote sensing will revolutionize the way we monitor trees

[sendtonews key="EjmSP20gQK-2593093-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Dublin, the capital and largest city of Ireland. Beyond its pub culture, Dublin is known as a modern culinary destination and a UNESCO City of Literature.



"Dublin is located near the midpoint of Ireland’s east coast in the province of Leinster. The city, which covers an area of around 115 square kilometers, is bordered by the Dublin Mountains, a low mountain range to the south, and is surrounded by flat farmland to the north and west," says ESA.



"The city straddles the River Liffey, which rises in the Wicklow Mountains and flows around 80 kilometers eastwards through the city of Dublin, in which it is canalised and bordered with quays. It then empties into Dublin Bay, an arm of the Irish Sea."



Dublin has an abundance of green spaces, including one of the largest enclosed public parks in any European capital city. Phoenix Park, which was originally formed as a royal hunting park in the 1660s, includes 707 hectares of green space.



Video Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The city of Dublin on Ireland's east coast

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features the province of Zaragoza in northeast Spain. The image was captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission.



"Together with the provinces of Huesca and Teruel, Zaragoza formed the old kingdom of Aragon. Its capital, also called Zaragoza (not visible in this image) is home to around half of Aragon’s population," says ESA.



"The Ebro River can be seen winding its way through the province from west to east in this image. Between its source in the Cantabrian Mountains in the northwest and its delta on the Mediterranean coast, the Ebro River is fed by more than 200 tributaries as it flows 910 km across much of northern Spain."



Since rainfall is very scarce in this region, irrigation in the Ebro basin is critically important. In the valleys surrounding the Ebro River, many fields are used for growing crops such as corn, wheat, and barley.



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The province of Zaragoza in northeast Spain

[sendtonews key="oL4FnPTGCV-2384527-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> features a visual dataset of.methane emissions from wetlands across the globe. Atmospheric methane levels have reached record highs in recent years, and wetlands are a major source of these emissions.&nbsp;



"Methane is an important greenhouse gas that contributes substantially to global warming. On a molecule by molecule basis, methane is much more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, the main driver of warming," says NASA.



"Though human activities, including agriculture, oil and natural gas production and use, and waste disposal, collectively contribute the majority of methane to the atmosphere, about a third of total methane emissions comes from wetlands."&nbsp;



According to NASA, understanding methane emissions from wetlands and other natural sources is critically important for scientists and policymakers who are working to combat climate change by reducing emissions from human activities.



Video Credit: NASA Goddard



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Wetlands are a major source of methane emissions

[sendtonews key="f8fukm28Vz-2491833-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> reveals the evolution of the Columbia Glacier in southeastern Alaska. Columbia is among the fastest shrinking glaciers in the world, and the video documents its rapid retreat over the years.&nbsp;



Columbia Glacier is a large, multi-branched calving glacier that flows out of the Chugach Mountains to the Prince William Sound.&nbsp;



According to USGS, Columbia had a long history of stability prior to 1980, with a length 41 miles, and small, short-lived advances or retreats.



In the years since 1980, however, satellite images have captured Columbia’s alarming retreat. By using false-color images, scientists can distinguish between snow and ice, open water, vegetation, and rocky debris on the glacier’s surface.



The series of false-color images featured in today's video were acquired over the span of 35 years. You can see that by 2021, the glacier’s main branch had retreated about 15 miles from its initial position.



The Columbia Glacier has also lost more than 50 percent of its volume, mostly due to calving. <a href="https://www.earth.com/video/nasa-reveals-3d-visual-of-an-atmospheric-river/">NASA</a> reports that while climate change likely started the retreat, mechanical processes kept the disintegration going.



The NASA images are provided by Jesse Allen, Robert Simmon, Joshua Stevens, and Lauren Dauphin using data from Landsat satellites, from the U.S. Geological Survey, and data from MODIS on NASA’s Terra satellite. The structure of Columbia’s moraine played a large role in the stability of the glacier before 1980. 



Like other tidewater glaciers, the Columbia built up a moraine over time, and the mixture of ice and rock functioned like a dam keeping out the sea. It was supported on one end by the shoreline and by the underwater terminal moraine at the other.



Video Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/&nbsp; NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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The rapid retreat of the Columbia Glacier

[sendtonews key="0879czfG3k-1785905-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features the Pyrenees Mountains, which form a natural boundary between France and Spain in southwest Europe.



The mountain range is 430 kilometers in length. It stretches from the Mediterranean Sea on the east to the Atlantic Ocean on the west.



At an elevation of 3404 meters, Pico de Aneto is the highest mountain peak in the Pyrenees, and the third-highest peak in Spain. Pico de Aneto is located in the Posets-Maladeta Natural Park, which spans more than 82,000 acres.&nbsp;



"Geological studies have revealed that the Pyrenees Mountains have been around for longer than the Alps, with their sediments first deposited in coastal basins during the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras," reports ESA.



"The entire mountain range formed due to the upwelling of large sedimentary rocks by the collision of the Iberian and the Eurasian plate around 100 to 150 million years ago, followed by intense erosion from ice and water."



The western Pyrenees receive more precipitation due to moisture blowing in from the Atlantic Ocean. The mountain range contains many lakes, several small glaciers, and some of the highest waterfalls in Europe.



Video &amp; Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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The Pyrenees Mountains in southwest Europe

[sendtonews key="6HyfrAJTBI-1831843-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.stowers.org/">Stowers Institute for Medical Research</a> describes why experts are studying zebrafish to gain a better understanding of how the immune system responds to injury. Zebrafish have the ability to repair and regenerate organs.



“Organ regeneration offers an exciting opportunity for studying the immune system and to inquire why some species can regenerate organs like the heart or missing limbs while others like humans cannot,” explained Dr. Tatjana Piotrowski.



Zebrafish sensory organ hair cells are an ideal system to investigate the pathways and cell types involved in regeneration since they are easily destroyed with antibiotics and begin regenerating within five hours. This enabled the researchers to identify the exact timing and genetic programs for each anti-inflammatory macrophage activation state.&nbsp;



“Our hypothesis is that human macrophages do not receive the proper chemical activation 'cocktail' to instruct pro-regenerative processes,” said Dr. Nicolas Denans. “Identifying the molecular recipe of macrophage activation in zebrafish may one day enable us to design regenerative immunotherapies in humans.”&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



“The new evidence is a valuable resource for comparative studies on the genetic programs involved in macrophage-mediated repair and regeneration. In other words, different types of injuries may induce different kinds of inflammatory responses. We want to decipher whether this 'language' is universal or if there are a variety of dialects."



Video Credit: Stowers Institute for Medical Research&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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How the immune system responds to injury

[sendtonews key="0dEcERCq61-2283382-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from Stowers...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes how record-breaking heat expressed itself around the world in 2022.



Scientists have determined that 2022 was the 5th warmest year since 1880. Furthermore, the last nine consecutive years have been the warmest on record.



From devastating floods and wildfires to natural disasters like Hurricane Ian, 2022 showed us yet again how a warming climate affects people across the globe.&nbsp;



"As we look back at 20:22 and years past, we see that each year we better understand the challenges we face and how important it is to meet them," says NASA.



Video/ Image Credit: NASA Goddard



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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2022 illustrated the consequences of a warming climate

[sendtonews key="3UUsNkFOuS-2487333-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

Earth,Like,Exoplanet,3d,Render

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes two exoplanets that are orbiting a star 218 light-years away. A team of researchers led by the University of Montreal has found evidence that these planets are "water worlds."



The experts used data from NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes. They discovered that exoplanets Kepler-138 c and Kepler-138 could be composed largely of water.



"We previously thought that planets that were a bit larger than Earth were big balls of metal and rock, like scaled-up versions of Earth, and that's why we called them super-Earths," explained study co-author Björn Benneke.&nbsp;



"However, we have now shown that these two planets, Kepler-138 c and d, are quite different in nature and that a big fraction of their entire volume is likely composed of water. It is the best evidence yet for water worlds, a type of planet that was theorized by astronomers to exist for a long time."



Video Credit: NASA Goddard



Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and Leah Hustak (STScI)



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Two distant planets may be "water worlds"

[sendtonews key="QIoVYJqRBi-2434608-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes Earth’s interconnected systems, and how this network is affected by rising temperatures.&nbsp;



During 2020, average global temperatures matched the hottest year on record. The hurricane season was also record-breaking, with many of the storms intensifying at extraordinary speeds. Hot water in the ocean is fuel for hurricanes. The satellite data shows that it's all one interconnected system showing how Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected.



According to NASA, dust swept up from Northern Africa plays a major role in the formation of hurricanes, and is also a key source of fertilization in the Amazon rainforest. As a result of<a href="https://www.earth.com/news/seagrass-wasting-disease-is-fueled-by-climate-change/"> climate</a> change, dust plumes are expected to decline, which will have an effect on vegetation far away.&nbsp;



Images from Earth-observing satellites show how the world’s plant life is affected by natural disasters, fires, and deforestation. Satellites also reveal how widespread changes in vegetation impact waterways,&nbsp; the climate, air quality. Satellites communicate by using radio waves to send signals to the antennas on the Earth. "Earth From Space" is a groundbreaking two-hour special that reveals a spectacular new space-based vision of our planet. 



Video Credit: NASA Goddard&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected

[sendtonews key="JbW4VsY53O-1632195-12187" type="single"] Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected...

Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://welcome.miami.edu/">University of Miami</a> Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science explores how changes in water temperatures have affected tiger shark habitats and movements in the North Atlantic Ocean. The study reveals that rising temperatures have caused the sharks to shift toward the poles over the past 40 years.



“Tiger shark annual migrations have expanded poleward, paralleling rising water temperatures,” explained study lead author Neil Hammerschlag. “These results have consequences for tiger shark conservation, since shifts in their movements outside of marine protected areas may leave them more vulnerable to commercial fishing.”



The researchers analyzed nine years of tracking data from satellite-tagged tiger sharks, combined with four decades of conventional tag and recapture data provided by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Cooperative Shark Tagging Program.



The experts found that during the last decade of record heat, for every one-degree Celsius increase in water temperatures, tiger sharks migrated further poleward by over 400 kilometers. They also migrated two weeks earlier than usual to waters off the northeastern coast of the United States.



“Given their role as apex predators, these changes to tiger shark movements may alter predator-prey interactions, leading to ecological imbalances, and more frequent encounters with humans,” concluded Professor Hammerschlag.



Video Credit: University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Tiger sharks are shifting poleward as temperatures rise

Today’s Video of the Day from the University of Miami...