Saturn's moon, Enceladus, is one of three moons that appear to contain subsurface oceans underneath an icy shell. Marc Van Norden / NASA / Flickr / CC by 2.0
By Zulfikar Abbany
"We don't have a definition of life," says Kevin Peter Hand, one early California morning when we speak via video. "We don't actually know what life is."
<p>He says that in between sips of coffee, as though it were perfectly obvious.</p><p>But scientists must really get bored — even annoyed — by journalists repeatedly asking how their fundamental research in space can be applied in the <em>real world</em>. It is a question worth asking, however. Especially when they tell you that they are looking for a "second origin of life." You just have to ask why.</p><p>Fortunately, Hand, who heads NASA's Ocean Worlds Lab, is charming and gentle as he explains his fascination with what he calls "alien oceans" both on Earth and on distant water worlds, like Jupiter's moon, Europa, Saturn's moon, Enceladus, or Triton, a "bizarre" object that rotates in the opposite direction from its host planet, Neptune.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzUzNTU2Ni9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwNDk1NzcyMX0.iIJrx-5xjFFb_3D22H6P3AN4v3MvX87hBZa-sJzIIKI/img.png?width=980" id="7198f" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="946767de5696a09fc34090e5ade96142" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" /><p>"We have numerous hypotheses for how life originated on Earth," says Hand. "For instance, it may have originated in the hydrothermal vents of our ocean, or in warm tide pools on the continents of an ancient Earth, or perhaps it originated from spark discharge from lightning in the atmosphere and precipitating organic compounds glued together to form life… But nothing has so far crawled out of the lab."</p>
Alien Oceans Here and There
<p>Europa, Enceladus, and Triton are just three of over 200 moons in our solar system. But they are special moons. They seem to have live, liquid water environments below the surface — also known as subsurface oceans — under an icy shell.</p><p>"These are global liquid oceans covered with ice," says Hand. "And if we go to Europa or Enceladus, these worlds where hydrothermal vents could exist, but where no continents exist, and there's no atmosphere, and if we found life, that would almost certainly point to an origin of life in hydrothermal vents."</p><p>And that may then tell us more about life on Earth. </p><p>Hydrothermal vents are found at extreme depths of around 6,000 kilometers (3,728 miles) in vast trenches below the surface of Earth's own ocean.</p><p>Not so long ago, those trenches were believed to be too dark for any life to exist. But through oceanographic research and commercial prospectors trawling for rare minerals like manganese nodules, we now know that hydrothermal vents are teeming with microbial life. So, the same may be true on a distant moon.</p><p>"That's not to say we'd be able to cross off the potential for the origin of life in tide pools on ancient Earth, but if we found life in hydrothermal vents on these moons, we would at least have another data point," says Hand.</p>Biology Beyond Earth
<p>Biology — or organic life as we know it — is perhaps the final piece in a jigsaw puzzle for space scientists.</p><p>Thanks to Galileo, says Hand, we know that the laws of physics work beyond Earth. So, too, with the principles of chemistry and geology.</p><p>"But we don't know whether this phenomenon called life has happened a second, independent time from life here on Earth. And that's why the question of a second origin of life is so compelling," says Hand.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzUzNTYxNy9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTU5OTc0MzIyMX0.qE2ydg5bNdxr2x0-ALNyOPM3K8iOTQzPp1cdbbtikoc/img.png?width=980" id="a389a" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="720a25ec63df8ccb03462e1f5752f8f3" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" /><p>And it's vital that that second origin of life is discovered — if at all — on planets, moons and other celestial bodies deep in the solar system, bodies that are too far away for any Earthly life to have reached or "contaminated" what may, or may not, be there.</p><p>"It would be hard for an Earth rock to get out there with Earth microbes and seed those oceans with DNA-based life," says Hand. "So, if we find life on these worlds, they will represent a separate, independent origin of life and, as such, that will tell us about the diversity of life, not just in our solar system, but in the universe as a whole."</p>
The Europa Clipper
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="367f258c4634fbd67ad3ce7ef3a73b5f"><iframe lazy-loadable="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GqTaDCt_F1Y?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span><p>Hand's focus for now is Jupiter's moon, Europa. One of his current projects is the <a href="https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/europa-clipper/" target="_blank">Europa Clipper</a> mission, which will perform about 45 so-called "flybys" of the moon. </p><p>Its launch date has yet to be decided. But the plan is for the Europa Clipper to take hi-resolution images of the moon's surface on a scale of between 50 centimeters per pixel and tens of meters per pixel.</p><p>It will look for organics, like salt.</p><p>It will have an ice penetrating radar onboard, and spectrometers that could "taste" any plumes erupting out of Europa.</p><p>"It will fly through the plumes and capture some of that material so we can analyze it directly. That will be phenomenal, but it won't get us down to the surface," says Hand. So, they are working on another mission that would land on Europa, too.</p>Trident for Triton
<p>Meanwhile, NASA's <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-selects-four-possible-missions-to-study-the-secrets-of-the-solar-system" target="_blank">Discovery Program</a> has two further outer solar system moon missions under consideration. One of those missions is called Trident. And if it's selected to move forward, the mission will investigate Neptune's moon, Triton.</p><p>Trident would launch in 2026 for a 12-year journey to Triton. The last spacecraft to study Triton was Voyager 2, which launched in 1977. It got to within 40,000 km of Triton, whereas Trident would get as close as 500 km on two flybys.</p><p>"Voyager gave us pictures that let us see geysers and plumes on Triton and that was 30 years ago — 50 years before Trident," says Yohai Kaspi, a professor of atmospheric dynamics and planetary science at the Weizmann Institute in Israel. "But with today's technology and imaging, we can do much better."</p><p>Kaspi and his colleagues are contributing a special clock to the project, with which they hope to measure the density and temperature of Triton's atmosphere.</p><p>The clock is called an Ultra-Stable Oscillator (USO).</p><p>It's a basically quartz clock, like a quartz wristwatch, but it's kept it at a very stable temperature to protect it from all the temperature variations in space.</p><p>"You hold it in a little oven, literally a tiny oven, with a stable temperature of one milliKelvin," says Kaspi, "and that gives us an accurate time frequency."</p><p>The spacecraft will have a radio link to Earth for the purpose of Kaspi's experiment and for general use, such as navigation. It will be a constant signal.</p><p>But the speed at which that signal travels back to Earth will change as the spacecraft enters and moves through Triton's atmosphere. The atmosphere is almost a filter through which the signal will have to pass. Measuring and comparing the difference in time it takes the signal to travel to Earth will allow scientists to measure thickness of Triton's atmosphere and build a profile of the moon's atmospheric temperature.</p>How Do Moon Oceans and Their Atmospheres Interact?
<p>Kaspi says Triton's atmosphere makes it unique. "Enceladus is too small to have an atmosphere and Europa barely has an atmosphere," he says. "Triton's atmosphere is not as dense as the one on Earth but it's enough of an atmosphere to transport material around. And in addition to that, it's likely that Triton was not even formed in our solar system. So, it's a real opportunity."</p><p>If the mission goes ahead, it may also be an opportunity to understand more about the interaction between subsurface oceans, or the "interior" of such moons, and their atmospheres. Because atmospheres are just as important for maintaining life and water is for originating life.</p><p>"We see these plumes coming from the interior, and they are then transported by the atmosphere. We see these active geysers and then these streaks on the planet, and they're all in the same direction," Kaspi says. "So, you would assume that there is a wind going from one side to the other. Voyager observed that. But that is about as much as we know."</p><p>What we don't know, says Kaspi, is how much of Triton's atmosphere originated from the interior, or whether the subterranean ocean can communicate or interact much with the outside.</p><p>The instruments on Trident are designed to find out how the whole system works together. They may even get us a little closer to that elusive definition of life itself.</p><p>"I hope that maybe 400 years from now our descendants will be able to point to innovations and discoveries that we made and go, 'Wow, can you believe they argued about the importance of searching for life beyond Earth and its application?'" says NASA's Kevin Hand.</p><p>"And perhaps they will be able to laugh about that in the same way that we look at Galileo and say: 'Of course, Galileo's work was pivotal in changing the way we think about the universe' — and everything that cascades from that, right down to the computer conversation that we're having now."</p><p>Message received.</p>
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Researchers have turned to hydrophones, instruments that use underwater microphones to gather data beyond the reach of any camera or satellite. Pxfuel
By Kristen Pope
Melting and crumbling glaciers are largely responsible for rising sea levels, so learning more about how glaciers shrink is vital to those who hope to save coastal cities and preserve wildlife.
<p>But it is hard to get good pictures and measurements because glaciers typically are in remote, difficult-to-reach, and even dangerous locations. Satellites are often used to measure glacial retreat, but these images are far from complete, especially when it's cloudy, foggy, raining, or snowing.</p><p>So researchers have turned to hydrophones, instruments that use underwater microphones to gather data beyond the reach of any camera or satellite. Hydrophones can record underwater in all conditions. Originally used by the military to detect submarines, hydrophones are now one more tool scientists have to learn about climate change. The devices collect data continuously and they are relatively inexpensive and easy to deploy and maintain in many different areas of the world to monitor sea ice, underwater earthquakes, ship noise, and even wildlife patterns.</p>
Groans, Creaks, Icebergs’ Calving Splashes
<p>Oskar Glowacki already knew that melting glacial ice sounds like frying bacon. As ice bubbles burst, anyone nearby can hear crackling and popping, said Glowacki, a postdoctoral scholar at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Using hydrophones, he and other scientists now can make more nuanced measurements of how a changing climate sounds underwater, from the groans, creaks and splashes of a calving iceberg to the changes in whale songs as the ocean warms.</p><p>Glowacki recently used a pair of hydrophones to study the underwater world of glaciers, publishing his findings in <a href="https://www.the-cryosphere.net/14/1025/2020/" target="_blank">The Cryosphere</a>. He and co-author Grant B. Deane measured glacier retreat by <a href="https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/07/melting-glaciers-sound-like-frying-bacon/" target="_blank">recording the sounds of ice</a> – from small chunks to enormous slabs – falling off the glacier and splashing into the water.</p><p>During the summer of 2016, Glowacki's team placed two hydrophones near Hansbreen Glacier in Hornsund Fjord, Svalbard. For a month and a half, they recorded sounds, also using three time-lapse cameras to collect images – including the "drop height" (how far the ice fell into the water) – so they could compare photos to the recordings. The team created a formula to represent the relationship between the size of a piece of ice falling from a glacier and the sound it makes underwater, also accounting for the pieces of ice falling from varying heights. (Hear an example of the sound an iceberg makes while calving <a href="https://soundcloud.com/user-248456662/iceberg-calving-hansbreen-glacier" target="_blank">here</a>.)</p><p>"Iceberg calving, defined as mechanical loss of ice from the edges of glaciers and ice shelves, is thought to be one of the most important components of the total ice loss," they note in their paper. They mention also that 32-40% of the Greenland ice sheet's mass loss is from solid ice discharge. However, Glowacki says it isn't just one process leading to glaciers losing mass: Surface melt, calving, and under-sea melting are all contributing factors.</p><p>Satellites are often used to measure glacial retreat, but the images they provide don't present a complete picture, and Glowacki and other scientists say they hope hydrophones can help provide more answers. Given that glaciers are typically remote and difficult to reach, collecting data remotely is key. Hydrophones, on the other hand, can record underwater in all these conditions.</p><p>Hydrophones also collect acoustic data and smaller events hard to find from a satellite image. "In a single day, [you] can have 100 or 200 icebergs breaking off from a single glacier," Glowacki says.</p><p>Glowacki says he and his team plan to further study iceberg calving, including studying additional glaciers, and collecting data for longer periods of time.</p>
Unlocking Information About Antarctic Ice Shelf
<p>Other researchers also are using hydrophones to learn more about crumbling glaciers. Bob Dziak, research oceanographer with the NOAA/Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory <a href="https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/acoustics" target="_blank">acoustics research group</a>, captured a massive calving event of the Nansen Ice Shelf in Antarctica with a hydrophone. He published the results with colleagues in <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2019.00183/full" target="_blank">Frontiers in Earth Science</a></p><p>On April 7, 2016, satellite images showed a massive calving event had occurred on the ice shelf. The paper described it as the "first large scale calving event in >30 years."</p><p>However, once Dziak and colleagues delved into the data from three hydrophones deployed 60 kilometers east of the ice shelf, they uncovered a series of "icequakes" from January to early March 2016. He and other researchers believe that much of the ice actually broke free in mid-January to February, but it remained in the same location until an April storm – which their paper described as the "largest low-pressure storm recorded in the previous seven months" – broke the ice free.</p><p>"We suspected that the icebergs broke apart but remained in place – kind of pinned in place – until a major storm with high winds passed through the area and, finally, it was that last push that pushed the icebergs out to sea," Dziak says.</p><p>He and his co-authors wrote that "fortuitous timing and proximity of the hydrophone deployment presented a rare opportunity to study cryogenic signals and ocean ambient sounds of a large-scale ice shelf calving and iceberg formation event."</p>Listening to Songs of Humpback Whales
<p><a href="https://www.mbari.org/" target="_blank">Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute</a> studies the ocean, including its acoustics. One of the institute's projects involves examining the soundscape of California's Monterey Bay, including sounds from animals, humans, weather, and geologic processes like earthquakes. The researchers once even recorded an under-sea landslide. They also focus on recording and analyzing the <a href="http://www.mbari.org/humpback-song/" target="_blank">songs of humpback whales</a>. Male humpback whales' songs can be over 15 minutes in length, and they can be repeated for long periods of time – even hours. Listening to these songs and analyzing them can provide unique insights into the lives of these complex animals.</p><p>"Any time we want to study marine mammals, sound gives us a window into their lives because they use sound for all of their essential life activities, really," says institute biological oceanographer John Ryan. "Communication, foraging, reproduction, navigation – depending on the species, of course."</p><p>Previously, scientists had thought singing occurred only during courtship and mating, but now they think whales may also use song while migrating and hunting. They know song has a crucial role in the whales' lives.</p><p>"There's a whole other dimension to humpback whale song," Ryan says. "It is a mode of cultural transmission in this species. They learn songs from each other. They share songs as a population, and when populations mix and mingle, they learn new ideas, they explore with their song, improvise, and it's a real essential part of their culture."</p><p>In 2015, institute researchers placed a hydrophone 3,000 feet deep, recording and analyzing humpback whale songs. Between 2015 and 2018, they collected over 26,000 hours of audio, which they used computer software to analyze. The researchers determined "peak singing season" in November through January, and they found most singing occurred at night. During peak season, songs were heard around 70% of the night.</p><p>However, from September 2015 to May 2016, they detected whales singing only about 11% of the time. Those months correlated with a period when the water temperature was especially high, depleting stocks of vital food sources like anchovies and krill, and correlating also with a toxic algal bloom. Scientists think the whales may have had to devote more time and energy to finding food, leaving less for singing. As researchers continue to study the worlds' oceans, they will undoubtedly learn more about underwater mysteries.</p><p>Listen to MBARI's live stream from beneath the bay <a href="https://www.mbari.org/soundscape-listening-room/" target="_blank">here</a>.</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from </em><em><a href="https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/07/hearing-the-under-sea-whispers-of-a-warming-climate/" target="_blank">Yale Climate Connections</a>.</em></p>
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The fact is, cats play different predatory roles in different natural and humanized landscapes. PIXNIO / CCO
By William S. Lynn, Arian Wallach and Francisco J. Santiago-Ávila
A number of conservationists claim cats are a zombie apocalypse for biodiversity that need to be removed from the outdoors by "any means necessary" – coded language for shooting, trapping and poisoning. Various media outlets have portrayed cats as murderous superpredators. Australia has even declared an official "war" against cats.
<p>Moral panics emerge when people perceive an existential threat to themselves, society or the environment. When in the grip of a <a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/moral-panic-3026420" target="_blank">moral panic</a>, the ability to think clearly and act responsibly is compromised. While the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13346" target="_blank">moral panic over cats</a> arises from valid concerns over threats to native species, it obscures the real driver: humanity's exploitative treatment of the natural world. Crucially, errors of scientific reasoning also underwrite this false crisis.</p><h2>The (Shaky) Case Against Cats</h2><p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/fee.1633" target="_blank">Conservationists</a> and the <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/2019/09/essay-to-save-birds-should-we-kill-off-cats/" target="_blank">media</a> often claim that cats are a main contributor to a <a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250062185" target="_blank">mass extinction</a>, a catastrophic loss of species due to human activities, like habitat degradation and the killing of wildlife.</p><p>As an interdisciplinary team of scientists and ethicists studying animals in conservation, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13346" target="_blank">we examined this claim</a> and found it wanting. It is true that like any other predator, cats can suppress the populations of their prey. Yet the extent of this effect is ecologically complex.</p><p>The potential impact of cats differs between <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2016.11.032" target="_blank">urban environments, small islands and remote deserts</a>. When <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0025970" target="_blank">humans denude regions of vegetation</a>, small animals are particularly at risk from cats because they have no shelter in which to hide.</p>
<p>Small animals are similarly vulnerable when humans kill apex predators that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyv100" target="_blank">normally would suppress cat densities and activity</a>. For instance, in the U.S., cats are a <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/urban-coyotes-eat-lot-garbageand-cats-180974461/" target="_blank">favorite meal for urban coyotes</a>, who <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0075718" target="_blank">moderate feline impact</a>; and in Australia, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2664.2012.02207.x" target="_blank">dingoes hunt wild cats</a>, which relieves pressure on native small animals.</p><p>Add in contrary evidence and the case against cats gets even shakier. For instance, in some ecological contexts, <a href="https://www.livescience.com/2102-birds-glad-cats-eat-rats.html" target="_blank">cats contribute to the conservation of endangered birds</a>, by preying on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2656.1999.00285.x" target="_blank">rats and mice</a>. There are also <a href="https://doi.org/10.1071/WR19181" target="_blank">documented cases of coexistence</a> between cats and native prey species.</p><p>The fact is, cats play <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/geb.12103" target="_blank">different predatory roles</a> in <a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2013/08/australian-cats-and-foxes-may-not-deserve-their-bad-rep" target="_blank">different natural and humanized landscapes</a>. Scientists cannot assume that because cats are a problem for some wildlife in some places, they are a problem in every place.</p>
Faulty Scientific Reasoning
<p>In our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13527" target="_blank">most recent publication</a> in the journal Conservation Biology, we examine an error of reasoning that props up the moral panic over cats.</p><p>Scientists do not simply collect data and analyze the results. They also establish a logical argument to explain what they observe. Thus, the reasoning behind a factual claim is equally important to the observations used to make that claim. And it is this reasoning about cats where claims about their threat to global biodiversity founder. In our analysis, we found it happens because many scientists take specific, local studies and overgeneralize those findings to the world at large.</p><p>Even when specific studies are good overall, projecting the combined "results" onto the world at large can cause unscientific overgeneralizations, particularly when <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2015.01.003" target="_blank">ecological context is ignored</a>. It is akin to pulling a quote out of context and then assuming you understand its meaning.</p>Ways Forward
<p>So how might citizens and scientists chart a way forward to a more nuanced understanding of cat ecology and conservation?</p><p>First, those examining this issue on all sides can acknowledge that both the well-being of cats and the survival of threatened species are legitimate concerns.</p><p>Second, cats, like any other predator, affect their ecological communities. Whether that impact is good or bad is a complex value judgment, not a scientific fact.</p><p>Third, there is a need for a more rigorous approach to the study of cats. Such an approach must be mindful of the importance of ecological context and avoid the pitfalls of faulty reasoning. It also means resisting <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13126" target="_blank">the siren call of a silver (lethal) bullet</a>.</p><p>There is no one-size-fits-all solution. Yet there are many options to consider. Protecting apex predators and their habitat is fundamental to enabling <a href="https://theconversation.com/lets-give-feral-cats-their-citizenship-45165" target="_blank">threatened species to coexist with cats</a>. In some cases, people may choose to segregate domestic cats from vulnerable wildlife: for instance, with <a href="http://www.feralcats.com/catio/" target="_blank">catios</a> where cats can enjoy the outdoors while being kept apart from wildlife. In other cases, unhomed cats may be managed with <a href="https://www.animallaw.info/article/community-cats-changing-legal-paradigm-management-so-called-%22pests%22" target="_blank">trap-neuter-return programs</a> and <a href="https://www.lanaicatsanctuary.org/" target="_blank">sanctuaries</a>.</p><p>Finally, contrary to the framing of some scientists and journalists, the dispute over cats is not primarily about the science. Rather, it evokes an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13494" target="_blank">ongoing debate</a> over the ethics that ought to guide humanity's relationship with other animals and nature.</p><p>This is the root of the moral panic over cats: the struggle to move beyond treating other beings with domination and control, toward fostering a relationship rooted in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2020.108648" target="_blank">compassion and justice</a>.</p>
<p>
<em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/william-s-lynn-182185" target="_blank">William S. Lynn</a> is a Research Scientist at Clark University.</em>
</p><p>
<em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/arian-wallach-120709" target="_blank">Arian Wallach</a> is a Lecturer at Centre for Compassionate Conservation, University of Technology Sydney.</em>
</p><p>
<em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/francisco-j-santiago-avila-598733" target="_blank">Francisco J. Santiago-Ávila </a>is a Postdoctoral Researcher at University of Wisconsin-Madison.<br/>
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Disclosure statement: Arian Wallach receives funding from the Australian Research Council for research on cats, and from Alley Cat Allies for a workshop on cats in 2017. Francisco J. Santiago-Ávila and William S. Lynn do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</em>
</p><p>
<em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://theconversation.com/dont-blame-cats-for-destroying-wildlife-shaky-logic-is-leading-to-moral-panic-138710" target="_blank">The Conversation</a>.</em>
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If you lived in a community suffering from bad air quality in 1981, chances are your neighborhood hasn't improved much. That's the takeaway from a new study that found despite years of progress to improve air pollution, wealthy, white Americans are breathing much cleaner air than low-income communities of color, The Guardian reported.
<p>"Disadvantaged communities remain persistently exposed to higher levels of air pollution," said Jonathan Colmer, an economist at the University of Virginia and co-author of the new <a href="https://science.sciencemag.org/content/369/6503/575" target="_blank">study</a> published in the journal <em>Science</em>, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-environment-pollution/after-three-decades-most-polluted-us-neighborhoods-havent-changed-idUSKCN24V3BS#:~:text=After%20three%20decades%2C%20most%20polluted%20U.S.%20neighborhoods%20haven't%20changed,-Nichola%20Groom&text=Likewise%2C%20the%20least%20polluted%20areas,decades%20in%20the%20United%20States." target="_blank">Reuters</a> reported. "This was true in 1980, it was true in 1990, 2000, 2010, and so on."</p><p>The study examined fine particulate matter, known as PM2.5, across the United States dating back to 1981. It found that the concentration of pollution from fine particulate matter fell about 70 percent between 1981 and 2016. Experts attribute the progress to stricter emissions regulations, more fuel-efficient vehicles and a decrease in coal-fired plants, Reuters reported.</p><p>But even with four decades of air quality improvement, low-income communities of color still do not have equal access to clean air. That's particularly worrying because of the connection between pollution and COVID-19. Recently, a group of <a href="https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/covid-pm" target="_blank">Harvard data scientists</a> found that a person living in areas with high-particulate pollution is 15 percent more likely to die from COVID-19 than someone living in an area with only slightly less air pollution, <a href="https://www.wellandgood.com/air-pollution-covid-19/" target="_blank">Well and Good</a> reported.</p>
<p>"The persistence of these relative disparities were striking," Colmer told <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/07/30/896635668/air-quality-disparities-persist-despite-overall-gains" target="_blank">NPR</a>. "Federal and state guidelines aim for all people and places to enjoy the same degree of protection from environmental hazards. We're falling short in terms of addressing relative disparities."</p><p>The study was released four months after the Trump administration rejected an Environmental Protection Agency recommendation to tighten air quality regulations, Reuters reported. Though the administration countered that current standards were adequate, the evidence suggests otherwise.</p><p>"If a child was born in Los Angeles county today, they would be exposed to the same amount of pollution the average child was exposed to in the early 1990s," Colmer said in The Guardian.</p>
<p><br>"This paper nicely shines a spotlight on the fact that these disparities continue to be large and that we ought to do something about them," said Joshua Apte, an environmental scientist at the University of California, Berkeley not involved in the study, Reuters reported.</p><p>To address the disparities, researchers note that housing discrimination is one of the main culprits, as low-income communities are often located near sources of pollution, according to NPR.</p><p>But housing discrimination isn't the only issue.</p><p>"Only when we figure out what the causes of the disparities are can we then think about, 'Okay, what are the appropriate policies we can use to mitigate these disparities?'" Lala Ma, an environmental economist at the University of Kentucky told NPR.</p>
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A group of 150 leading scientific and economic experts on the Amazon basin have taken it upon themselves to launch an ambitious conservation project. Jlwad / Wikimedia Commons / CC by 4.0
By Shanna Hanbury
With the Amazon rainforest predicted to be at, or very close to, its disastrous rainforest-to-savanna tipping point, deforestation escalating at a frightening pace, and governments often worsening the problem, the need for action to secure the future of the rainforest has never been more urgent.
<p>Now, a group of 150 leading scientific and economic experts on the Amazon basin have taken it upon themselves to launch an ambitious conservation project. The newly founded Science Panel for the Amazon (SPA) aims to consolidate scientific research on the Amazon and propose solutions that will secure the region's future — including the social and economic well-being of its thirty-five-million inhabitants.</p><p>"Never before has there been such a rigorous scientific evaluation on the Amazon," said Carlos Nobre, the leading Amazon climatologist and one of the chairs of the Scientific Panel. The newly organized SPA, he adds, will model its work on the style of the authoritative reports produced by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in terms of academic diligence and the depth and breadth of analysis and recommendations.</p><p>The Amazon Panel, is funded by the United Nation's Sustainable Development Solutions Network and supported by prominent political leaders, such as former Colombian President, Juan Manuel Santos and the elected leader of the Coordinator of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon River Basin, José Gregorio Díaz Mirabal. The SPA plans to publish its first report by April 2021.</p>
Reversing the Amazon Tipping Point
<p>Over the last five decades, the Amazon rainforest lost almost a fifth of its forest cover, putting the <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/the-tipping-point-is-here-it-is-now-top-amazon-scientists-warn/" target="_blank">biome on the edge</a> of a dangerous cliff. <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/01/impending-amazon-tipping-point-puts-biome-and-world-at-risk-scientists-warn/" target="_blank">Studies show</a> that if 3 to 8% more forest cover is lost, then deforestation combined with escalating climate change is likely to cause the Amazon ecosystem to collapse.</p><p>After this point is reached, the lush, biodiverse rainforest will receive too little precipitation to maintain itself and quickly shift from forest into a degraded savanna, causing enormous <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/02/amazon-tipping-point-puts-brazils-agribusiness-energy-sector-at-risk-top-scientists/" target="_blank">economic damage</a> across the South American continent, and releasing vast amounts of forest-stored carbon to the atmosphere, further destabilizing the global climate.</p><p>Amazon researchers are now taking a proactive stance to prevent the Amazon Tipping Point: "Our message to political leaders is that there is no time to waste," Nobre wrote in the SPA's press release.</p><p>Amid escalating forest loss in the Amazon, propelled by the anti-environmentalist agenda of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/04/satellite-data-show-amazon-rainforest-likely-drier-more-fire-prone-this-year/" target="_blank">experts fear</a> that this year's burning season, <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/07/fires-rage-in-the-amazon-despite-official-ban-greenpeace-photos-reveal/" target="_blank">already underway</a>, may exceed the August 2019 wildfires that shocked the world. Most Amazon basin fires are not natural in cause, but <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/09/brazilian-amazon-fires-scientifically-linked-to-2019-deforestation-report/" target="_blank">intentionally set</a>, often by land grabbers invading indigenous territories and other conserved lands, and causing massive deforestation.</p><p>"We are burning our own money, resources and biodiversity — it makes no sense," Sandra Hacon told Mongabay; she is a prominent biologist at the Brazilian biomedical Oswaldo Cruz Foundation and has studied the effects of Amazon forest fires on health. It is expected that air pollution caused by this year's wildfire's, when combined with COVID-19 symptoms, will cause <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/overlap-of-fire-covid-19-peaks-a-catastrophe-for-brazils-amazon/" target="_blank">severe respiratory impacts</a> across the region.</p><p>Bolivian ecologist Marielos Penã-Claros, notes the far-reaching economic importance of the rainforest: "The deforestation of the Amazon also has a negative effect on the agricultural production of Uruguay or Paraguay, thousands of kilometers away."</p><p>The climate tipping point, should it be passed, would negatively effect every major stakeholder in the Amazon, likely <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/02/amazon-tipping-point-puts-brazils-agribusiness-energy-sector-at-risk-top-scientists/" target="_blank">wrecking</a> the agribusiness and energy production sectors — ironically, the sectors responsible for much of the devastation today.</p><p>"I hope to show evidence to the world of what is happening with land use in the Amazon and alert other governments, as well as state and municipal-level leadership. We have a big challenge ahead, but it's completely necessary," said Hacon.</p>
Scientists Offer Evidence, and Also Solutions.
<p>Creating a workable blueprint for the sustainable future of the Amazon rainforest is no simple task. The solutions mapped out, according to the Amazon Panel's scientists, will seek to not only prevent deforestation and curb global climate change, but to generate a new vision and action plan for the Amazon region and its residents — especially, fulfilling development goals via a sustainable standing-forest economy.</p><p>The SPA, Nobre says, will make a critical break with the purely technical approach of the United Nation's IPCC, which banned policy prescriptions entirely from its reports. In practice, this has meant that while contributing scientists can show the impacts of fossil fuels on the atmosphere, they cannot recommend ending oil subsidies, for example. "We inverted this logic, and the third part of the [SPA] report will be entirely dedicated to searching for policy suggestions," Nobre says. "We need the forest on its feet, the empowerment of the traditional peoples and solutions on how to reach development goals."</p><p>Researchers across many academic fields (ranging from climate science and economics to history and meteorology) are collaborating on the SPA Panel, raising hopes that scientific consensus on the Amazon rainforest can be reached, and that conditions for research cooperation will greatly improve.</p><p>SPA participants hope that a thorough scientific analysis of the rainforest's past, present and future will aid in the formulation of viable public policies designed to preserve the Amazon biome — hopefully leading to scientifically and economically informed political decisions by the governments of Amazonian nations.</p><p>"We are analyzing not only climate but biodiversity, human aspects and preservation beyond the climate issues," Paulo Artaxo, an atmospheric physicist at the University of São Paulo, told Mongabay.</p><p>Due to the urgency of the COVID-19 pandemic, the initiative's initial dates for a final report were pushed forward by several months, and a conference in China cancelled entirely. But the 150-strong team is vigorously pushing forward, and the first phase of the project — not publicly available — is expected to be completed by the end of the year.</p><p>The hope on the horizon is that a unified voice from the scientific community will trigger long-lasting positive changes in the Amazon rainforest. "More than ever, we need to hear the voices of the scientists to enable us to understand how to save the Amazon from wanton and unthinking destruction," said Jeffrey Sachs, the director of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, on the official launch <a href="https://www.theamazonwewant.org/" target="_blank">website</a> called <a href="https://www.theamazonwewant.org/" target="_blank">The Amazon We Want</a>.</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/07/scientists-launch-ambitious-conservation-project-to-save-the-amazon/" target="_blank">Mongabay</a>.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Scientists at the Australian Institute of Marine Science are engineering heat-resistant corals. Jonas Gratzer / Mongabay
By Johan Augustin
In a lab on Australia's east coast, scientists are concocting what they hope will be the solution to the steadily worsening problem of coral bleaching.
<p>Few people understand the Great Barrier Reef, and the challenges it faces, better than the scientists at the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS). And events of the past few years have them concerned about how well it can cope with rising water temperatures that have increased the <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/01/reef-bleaching-five-times-more-frequent-now-than-in-the-1980s-study-finds/" target="_blank">frequency</a>, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/04/06/great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching/" target="_blank">severity</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/06/world/australia/great-barrier-reefs-bleaching-dying.html" target="_blank">extent</a> of coral-bleaching events.</p><p>As water temperatures rise, the coral polyps flush out the photosynthetic algae that live in their tissue and give them their color. The corals depend on the algae for their energy, and without these symbionts, the newly bare, or "bleached," reefs slowly start to die.</p><p>Historically, bleaching events have occurred far enough apart in time that reefs have been able to recover, typically within about a decade. But in March this year, the Great Barrier Reef suffered its third <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/04/great-barrier-reef-suffers-biggest-bleaching-event-yet/" target="_blank">major bleaching event</a> in just five years.</p><p>"Three major widespread mass bleaching events throughout the Great Barrier Reef are clear indicators that ocean warming is happening faster than expected and the severity of the warming events is pushing corals beyond levels that these reefs can sustain," says Neal Cantin, a coral reef biologist at the AIMS.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzUxMDUxOS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYxOTc5NTg3M30.8HWZCyAHlLzByK_5G-SdZvJsUteDk6kw_oVuOyA_Dkg/img.jpg?width=980" id="c18d4" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="6b4668c3cc408cd0ea3e87af0beb870f" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
A branch of bleached coral. Jonas Gratzer / Mongabay
‘Remarkable Resiliency’
<p>Water temperatures this time around didn't reach as high as during the <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/03/climate-change-induced-bleaching-decimating-great-barrier-reef/" target="_blank">2016 event</a>, but the bleaching was worse for two key reasons, Cantin says.</p><p>"The first is how soon it follows the 2016 and 2017 back-to-back bleaching events. The second concern is the footprint of heat in 2020," he says.</p><p>That "footprint" refers to the total extent of reef affected by bleaching. While the 2016 event had the most extreme levels of heat, Cantin says, it was limited mostly to the northern part of the Great Barrier Reef, severely bleaching 35% of the total reef area. This time around, the entire length of the reef — a span of 2,300 kilometers (1,300 miles) — was exposed to heat stress "capable of causing bleaching." That resulted in severe levels of bleaching on an additional 25% of the reefs, Cantin says.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzUxMDUzOS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1NTk5NzQxOH0.ZmUkJz3x1bsXmrwXBMKQ-VAFTrI8pbc4lG9R6GbLGmY/img.jpg?width=980" id="63720" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="531cdf1c8901036f10b2a06f846e65d5" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Bleached coral on the Great Barrier Reef. Jonas Gratzer / Mongabay
<p>But brewing in the AIMS lab are pioneering experiments aimed at finding <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/models-maps-and-citizen-scientists-working-to-save-the-great-barrier-reef/" target="_blank">scientific breakthroughs</a> for a problem that experts agree is <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/new-map-shows-warming-waters-where-coral-reefs-could-be-under-threat/" target="_blank">bound to get worse</a> over time. And they've already come up with a strong candidate for the answer to the bleaching problem: corals engineered to take the heat. In a method known as assisted gene flow — similar to how food crops are crossbred to emphasize favorable traits — scientists here single out the genetic properties that make certain coral species more resistant to heat, and find ways to pass it on.</p><p>These hybrids have already "demonstrated remarkable resiliency" to high water temperatures at the juvenile life stage inside the AIMS National Sea Simulator, says reef restoration scientist Kate Quigley. Her team also works with enhancing the symbiont algae.</p><p>"By pairing these enhanced corals with enhanced symbionts, we have been able to increase their heat resistance up to 26 times," Quigley says, pointing to a <a href="https://bio.biologists.org/content/9/1/bio047316" target="_blank">recently published study</a> with those findings. The researchers have also found that breeding these enhanced corals <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/mec.15482" target="_blank">creates new genetic diversity</a> in key traits associated with resisting higher water temperatures.</p><p>"The early results we have found in regards to enhancing corals' heat tolerance are encouraging," Quigley says. "I would describe these early experiments as successes."</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzUxMDU0My9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MzY4NTQ1OX0.Ewr_3ToVZ8LuJBQPE_nFEMt-G3h01Z2Xsdv13F85gDI/img.jpg?width=980" id="f2a1b" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="6fcfdaecd61d63211491732290baabbe" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
A tank of enhanced coral at the AIMS center being tested for their warm-water tolerance. Jonas Gratzer / Mongabay
Large-Scale Deployment
<p>The hybrids have one parent from northern, warmer, parts of the reef and one from the central, cooler, part. The results show that some of the strains have inherited the northern corals' temperature tolerance and can survive when placed in cooler environments. That suggests that over time, as these cooler regions heat up, these corals will be able to tolerate the rising temperatures better than the native corals.</p><p>"We have learned key fundamental biology about coral reproduction and heat tolerance that will be important moving forward in further developing new, scalable coral restoration methods," Quigley says. "We are [also] finding that heat tolerance can be passed from parents to offspring in reproducible, persistent ways."</p><p>These research projects fall under the wider Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program, which Cantin calls "the biggest single effort anywhere in the world to develop options for intervening on the reef to help it adapt and cope better with climate change."</p><p>"These interventions are promising," Cantin adds, "but none are ready to deploy large-scale."<span></span></p><p>For the enhanced corals to have any meaningful effect across a reef that stretches the same distance as New York City to Miami, they will need to be deployed in massive volumes. Another experiment at the AIMS, the Larval Restoration Project, is looking into how to do this, but with naturally occurring warm-adapted corals rather than the gene-edited ones from the AIMS lab. It's the largest coral reseeding project in history, launched in 2016 and funded by the Australian government.</p><p>The idea is that during the annual mass coral spawning, which takes place every year during the November full moon, researchers harvest millions of coral eggs and sperm. They then grow them in enclosures on the reef to produce coral larvae, which are later released onto bleached and damaged sections of the reef to repopulate them.</p><p>The coral species that spawn this year will be the ones that survived the bleaching in March, and therefore those with proven better heat tolerance. The harvest this time around "will allow us to find reefs, populations and individuals that are particularly hardy and that will act as breeding stock for the production of coral offspring able to withstand high heat," Quigley says.</p><p>"The search for hardy and resilient corals continues, but we have already seen some very promising results," she adds.</p>From Your Site Articles
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When Hungarian researchers placed paddlefish sperm and sturgeon eggs together in a lab, they produced babies that combined the genes of each. Thus, the sturdlefish was born. MDPI / CC by 4.0
What do you get when you cross an American paddlefish with a Russian sturgeon?
<p><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/scientists" target="_self">Scientists</a> thought the answer would be nothing. The two <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/endangered-species" target="_self">endangered species</a>, whose last common ancestor lived during the age of the dinosaurs, have been evolving separately for more than 184 million years, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/15/science/hybrid-sturgeon-paddlefish.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>. But when Hungarian researchers placed paddlefish sperm and sturgeon eggs together in a lab, they produced babies that combined the genes of each. Thus, the sturdlefish was born.</p><p>"I think it's pretty cool that these living fossils can still surprise us," Solomon David, an aquatic ecologist at Nicholls State University in Louisiana, who was not part of the research, told The New York Times.</p>
<div id="53457" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="2e195fc4dae3b7b981420f0d518811cd"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1281680411043811329" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">WAIT WHAT??!!! Crossing two different FAMILIES? Sturgeon x Paddlefish 🤯 https://t.co/CenvkCnm1U</div> — Dr. Solomon David (@Dr. Solomon David)<a href="https://twitter.com/SolomonRDavid/statuses/1281680411043811329">1594411397.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The scientists, who published their findings in the journal <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4425/11/7/753" target="_blank">Genes</a> in May, had not been trying to produce a hybrid. Instead, they wanted to breed both species separately for <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/conservation" target="_self">conservation</a> reasons.</p><p>The American paddlefish is the last paddlefish left swimming, after the Chinese paddlefish was <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/extinct-species-fish-china-2644654974.html" target="_self">declared extinct</a> in January. Sturgeon, meanwhile, are the "most threatened group of animals on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species," the <a href="https://www.iucn.org/content/sturgeon-more-critically-endangered-any-other-group-species#:~:text=Sturgeon%20more%20critically%20endangered%20than%20any%20other%20group%20of%20species,-Thu%2C%2018%20Mar&text=Eighty%20five%20percent%20of%20sturgeon,List%20of%20Threatened%20Species%E2%84%A2" target="_blank">conservation group said</a>.</p><p>Specifically, the scientists were trying to breed sturgeon through a process called gynogenesis, in which sperm are placed next to eggs in order to prompt them to reproduce asexually, <a href="https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-create-a-strange-hybrid-between-two-very-different-kinds-of-fish" target="_blank">Science Alert explained</a>.</p><p>No DNA was supposed to mix, but it did.</p>
<p>"We never wanted to play around with hybridization. It was absolutely unintentional," Dr. Attila Mozsar, a study coauthor and senior research fellow at the Research Institute for Fisheries and Aquaculture in Hungary, told The New York Times.</p><p>The successful hybrids surprised the scientists because previous attempts to combine the species had ended in failure, <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/07/17/hungarian-scientists-accidentally-bred-sturgeon-paddlefish-hybrid/5449784002/" target="_blank">according to USA TODAY</a>. Sturgeons are carnivores, while paddlefish are plankton-eating filter feeders with large snouts, The New York Times explained.</p><p>"This hybrid should die," study coauthor Miklós Bercsényi of the University of Pannonia told USA Today. "The embryonic development should not happen."</p><p>After it did, the researchers intentionally tried to replicate it, and saw more success. After a year, more than 100 have survived and many weigh more than six pounds.</p>
<p>"They grow well, they eat well," Mozsár told USA TODAY. "We keep them in a very safe place."</p><p>Some of the fish look more like their mothers with scutes, or bony scales. Others have their paddlefish fathers' snouts.</p><p>While their birth was surprising, researchers think it was possible because of the species' status as living fossils, animals like the crocodile that have not changed very much over the course of their evolution, Science Alert explained.</p><p>"These living fossil fishes have extremely slow evolutionary rates, so what might seem like a long time to us isn't quite as long of a time to them," David told The New York Times.</p><p>The sturdlefish are probably sterile, a trait shared by other hybrids like the mule, The New York Times pointed out. And the researchers don't plan to breed anymore, since they could pose a danger to wild fish. However, researchers do plan to study how sturgeon and paddlefish reproduce to see if they uncover anything that could help those species survive, Science Alert reported.</p>
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The Firefly Watch project is among the options for aspiring citizen scientists to join. Mike Lewinski / Wikimedia Commons / CC by 2.0
By Tiffany Means
Summer and fall are great seasons to enjoy the outdoors. But if you're already spending extra time outside because of the COVID-19 pandemic, you may be out of ideas on how to make fresh-air activities feel special. Here are a few suggestions to keep both adults and children entertained and educated in the months ahead, many of which can be done from the comfort of one's home or backyard.
<p><a href="https://www.cocorahs.org/" target="_blank">The Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, and Snow Network</a> (CoCoRaHS)</p><p><em>Open to U.S. and Canada residents</em></p><p>CoCoRaHS invites those with a penchant for precipitation to join its grassroots observation network. By observing, recording, and reporting daily accumulations of rain, snow, and hail in their own backyards, volunteers help fill in "holes" in the official network of precipitation gage data. Over time, these local observations will serve as a record of local climate. And climatologists will use this data to help put extreme precipitation events into historical context and to identify precipitation patterns.</p><p><a href="https://www.massaudubon.org/get-involved/citizen-science/firefly-watch" target="_blank">Firefly Watch</a></p><p><em>Open to U.S. and Canada residents</em></p><p>The Firefly Watch project seeks to answer the question of whether fireflies are disappearing from our summer evenings. Firefly enthusiasts interested in participating are asked to devote a minimum of 10 minutes weekly to observing firefly activity in their backyards or at other grassy locations. Sightings (or lack thereof) are then reported in an online database, along with basic weather conditions. In time, researchers hope the data gathered may help highlight the extent to which climate change has harmed fireflies, whether through loss of habitat or earlier peak appearance.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/penguintom79/penguin-watch" target="_blank">Penguin Watch</a></p><p><em>Open to residents worldwide</em></p><p>The Penguin Watch project aims to better understand the environmental threats responsible for the decline in penguin colonies. Volunteers will view short videos and image stills of Adélie, king, and other penguins captured by cameras around the Southern Ocean and Antarctic Peninsula, then count the number of visible adult penguins, chicks, and eggs. In summer 2020, the project is transitioning from monitoring penguin breeding patterns to monitoring foraging behavior.</p><p><a href="https://monarchwatch.org/calendar/" target="_blank">Monarch Watch</a></p><p><em>Open to U.S. residents</em></p><p>A nonprofit conservation and research program based at the University of Kansas, Monarch Watch depends on monarch butterfly and entomology enthusiasts to help investigate the decade-long decline in monarch butterfly numbers. By tracking counts of adult monarch butterflies and the timing of their north-south migrations, volunteers help researchers better predict the fall migration and overwintering population size – two characteristics that are influenced by weather and climate.</p>
<p><a href="http://amoywg.org/research-and-monitoring/" target="_blank">Re-sighting oystercatchers</a><br><em>Open to residents and tourists of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts</em></p><p>Barrier island beachgoers from Maine to Mexico can help monitor American oystercatcher populations by reporting "banded" birds to the American Oystercatcher Working Group. Upon spotting a flock of oystercatchers during the breeding, nesting, or migration seasons, volunteers are asked to note and report (or better yet, photograph) the color, code, and positioning of bracelets on the shorebirds' legs. Re-sighting assists scientists in researching environmental threats, such as sea-level rise, on the migration habits and feeding or nesting resources of these orange-beaked shorebirds, which are a species of "special concern" in some states.</p><p><a href="https://www.outdoors.org/conservation/climate-energy/citizen-science" target="_blank">Mountain Watch</a><br><em>Open to New Hampshire and Maine residents and tourists</em></p><p><span></span>The Appalachian Mountain Club encourages hikers to help scientists study climate change and its effects on the flowering and fruiting times of Appalachian flora through the Mountain Watch program. The program, which partners with the iNaturalist app, asks Appalachian Trail-goers to use their mobile devices to photograph plant life found in the White Mountain National Forest. Those images are automatically geo-tagged with date and location coordinates, which then assist researchers in learning more about the characteristics of forest and alpine vegetation.</p>
<p><a href="https://eorhawaii.org/about-eyes-of-the-reef/" target="_blank">Eyes of the Reef Hawai'i</a><br><em>Open to Hawai'i residents and tourists</em></p><p>The Eyes of the Reef is a statewide reporting network that encourages Hawai'ian Island ocean enthusiasts, fishers, and community members to assist in protecting Hawai'i's local reefs. Participants are asked to identify and report unhealthy reefs so that coral disease, coral bleaching, and invasive species spread events can be monitored by scientists as early as possible. Seventy to 90% of coral reefs will be killed off by warming oceans, ocean acidification, and pollution in the next 20 years, according to <a href="https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2020/02/24/climate-change-could-kill-coral-reefs/" target="_blank">a recent study</a> by a researcher at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa. Coral reefs may be eliminated worldwide by the year 2100.</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/07/7-climate-conscious-citizen-science-projects/" target="_blank">Yale Climate Connections</a>.</em></p><h5></h5>
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Global heating imposes a harsh cost at the most critical time of all: the moment of spawning. Pxfuel
By Tim Radford
German scientists now know why so many fish are so vulnerable to ever-warming oceans. Global heating imposes a harsh cost at the most critical time of all: the moment of spawning.
<p>"Our findings show that, both as embryos in eggs and as adults ready to mate, fish are far more sensitive to heat than in their larval stage or as sexually mature adults outside the mating season," said <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Flemming_Dahlke" target="_blank">Flemming Dahlke, a marine biologist</a> with the <a href="https://www.awi.de/" target="_blank">Alfred Wegener Institute at Bremerhaven</a>.</p><p>"On the global average, for example, adults outside the mating season can survive in water that's up to 10°C warmer than adults ready to mate, or fish eggs, can."</p><p>The finding – if it is confirmed by other research – should clear up some of the puzzles associated with fish numbers. There is clear evidence, established repeatedly over the decades, that <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/ocean-heatwaves-drive-more-fish-north/" target="_blank">fish are responding to climate change</a>.</p><p>But almost three fourths of the planet is blue ocean, and <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/hunger-threat-as-tropical-fish-seek-cooler-waters/" target="_blank">at depth is responding far more slowly</a> than the land surface to global heating fueled by fossil fuel exploitation that releases greenhouse gases.</p>
Nearing the Brink
<p>Since <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/abundant-fish-need-cool-seas-and-protection/" target="_blank">fish in the temperate zones already experience a wide variation</a> in seasonal water temperatures, it hasn't been obvious why species such as <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/sardines-swim-into-northern-waters-to-keep-cool/" target="_blank">cod have shifted nearer the Arctic, and sardines have migrated to the North Sea</a>.</p><p>But <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/ocean-warming-spurs-marine-life-to-rapid-migration/" target="_blank">marine creatures are on the move</a>, and although there are other factors at work, including overfishing and <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/fish-cant-smell-well-in-more-acidic-seas/" target="_blank">the increasingly alarming changes in ocean chemistry</a>, thanks to ever-higher levels of dissolved carbon dioxide, temperature change is part of the problem.</p><p>The latest answer, Dr Dahlke and his colleagues report in the journal <a href="https://science.sciencemag.org/cgi/doi/10.1126/science.aaz3658" target="_blank">Science</a>, is that many fish may already be living near the limits of their thermal tolerance.</p><p>The temperature safety margins during the moments of spawning and embryo might be very precise, and over hundreds of thousands of years of evolution, marine and freshwater species have worked out just what is best for the next generation. Rapid global warming upsets this equilibrium.</p><p>The Bremerhaven scientists looked at experiments, observations and recorded data for the life cycles of 694 marine and freshwater species, to decide that oxygen supply is the key decider of reproductive success. Warmer waters carry less dissolved oxygen. Embryo fish have no gills: they cannot simply take in deeper breaths.</p><p>Fish about to mate are busy producing extra mass in the form of sperm and egg cells: this additional body mass also needs oxygen. Even at lower temperatures, piscine cardiovascular systems are under stress.</p><p>So the reasoning follows that, if global heating continues, climate change and rising water temperatures are likely to affect the reproduction of perhaps 60% of all fish species.</p><p>"Some species might successfully manage this change," Dr Dahlke said. "But if you consider the fact that fish have adapted their mating patterns to specific habitats over extremely long timeframes, and have tailored their mating cycles of specific ocean currents and food sources, it has to be assumed that being forced to abandon their normal spawning areas will mean major problems for them."</p>
<p class=""><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/warming-oceans-deter-more-fish-from-spawning/" target="_blank">Climate News Network</a>.</em></p>
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Hundreds of sudden elephant deaths in Botswana aren't just a loss for the ecosystem and global conservation efforts. Mario Micklisch / Flickr / CC by 2.0
By Charli Shield
When an elephant dies in the wild, it's not uncommon to later find its bones scattered throughout the surrounding landscape.
<p>That's one way you can tell other elephants have passed through the area, says George Wittemyer, a wildlife conservation biologist at Colorado State University who's been researching African elephants in Kenya's Samburu National Reserve for more than 20 years.</p><p>Another sign, long-term elephant conservationist Joyce Poole adds, is the presence of tracks worn through the grass leading to its body. "The vegetation will be gone and the carcass will be surrounded by elephant dung because so many elephants will have visited and stayed," Poole says.</p><p>While scientists are yet to pinpoint what exactly struck down a reported 356 elephants in Botswana's Okavango Delta area, what we do know is that these deaths are not only significant for ecologists and conservationists — but elephants themselves. </p>
Elephant Burial Grounds
<p>Highly social creatures that form deep familial bonds, elephants have long been observed gathering at the site where a peer or family member has died — often spending hours, even days, quietly investigating the bodies or the bones of other dead elephants.</p><p>Although the popular idea that dying elephants are instinctively drawn to special communal graves — so-called "elephant graveyards" — is a myth, their tendency to go out of their way to visit the bones and tusks of the deceased isn't unlike human rituals at graveyards, says animal psychologist Karen McComb.</p><p>"They spend a lot of time touching and smelling skulls and ivory, placing the soles of their feet gently on top of them, and also lifting them up with their trunks," McComb, who's been studying African elephants for 25 years in Kenya's Amboseli National Park, told DW.</p><p>The most striking part of watching an elephant experience loss, Poole recalls, is the quietude. She still remembers one of the first elephant deaths she witnessed; a mother who birthed a stillborn calf. That elephant stayed with its baby for two days, trying to lift it and defending it from vultures and hyenas.</p><p>"I was so struck by the expression on her face and her body. She looked so dejected. It was really like, 'Oh God, these animals grieve…'. It was just so different," Poole told DW. </p>Witnessing Emotions in Animals
<p>Not all scientists are comfortable concluding that elephants grieve. Among the more than 30 reports of elephant reactions to death that Wittemyer co-reviewed in <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10329-019-00766-5" target="_blank">a study published in November 2019</a> were accounts of "enormous variation and nuance" he says. "It can be incredibly involved and intricate for extended periods or can be relatively cursory checks."</p><p>In Wittemyer's own experience, it can be difficult not to attribute some kind of emotional experience to the more involved interactions between elephants and their dead.</p><p>He shares the story of an "extraordinary event" involving the death of a 55 year-old matriarch in Kenya in a protected area that happened to be near his place of work. She was visited by multiple unrelated families while she was dying, including another matriarch that exerted such enormous effort attempting to lift her to her feet that she broke her tusk, which Wittemyer says, is "like breaking a tooth." </p><p><span></span>"It was a remarkable example of this heightened emotional state, it was very clearly a very stressful interaction," he says.</p>A Different Sensory World
<p>One factor that limits our ability to fully grasp the way elephants process and respond to loss is our markedly different sensory experiences of the world.</p><p>An elephant's world is fundamentally olfactory — based on smell. Ours is visual. Previous <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25053675/" target="_blank">research</a> has shown elephants possess the most scent receptors of any mammal, and can <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17949977/" target="_blank">use smell</a> to discern the difference between different human tribes from the same local area.</p><p>That could explain why elephants exhibit such interest in sniffing the bones and tusks of others, as a <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1617198/" target="_blank">2005 study</a> from McCombs highlighted. When presented with the skulls and ivory of long-dead elephants and those from other large herbivores, including rhino and buffalo, McCombs and her team found elephants approached and were specifically attracted to the remains of their own species. </p><p>Without access to the smells an elephant picks up on, Wittemyer says "an enormous amount of stuff" could be missed by humans when studying these behaviors.</p><p>While scientists cannot say what the elephants are thinking, it is clear that death — whether of a relative, a close companion, or just another member of their species — has some kind of meaning for elephants. </p><p>And why wouldn't it? Asks Poole, who points to the fact that elephants' survival depends on their social and familial relationships.</p><p>"Through the course of evolution they have evolved these complex rituals to hold families together. Those have to be driven by some sort of positive emotions, otherwise why would they bother?"</p><p>"They recognize that death, for somebody, is a big loss."</p>
<p class=""><em>Reposted with permission from </em><em><a href="https://www.dw.com/en/elephant-deaths-botswana-what-it-could-mean/a-54079677?maca=en-VAM_volltext_ecowatch-28485-html-copypaste" target="_blank">Deutsche Welle</a>.</em><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/r/entryeditor/2646364470#/" target="_self"></a></p>From Your Site Articles
- Elephant Poaching Is on the Rise in Botswana, Study Confirms ... ›
- In 'Conservation Disaster,' Hundreds of Botswana's Elephants Are ... ›
- Botswana Auctions Off First Licenses to Kill Elephants Since Ending ... ›
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Researchers Are Creating a Drone to Study Wild Dolphins With Help From Trained Dolphins
03 July
Science
To better understand how people influence the overall health of dolphins, Oklahoma State University's Unmanned Systems Research Institute is developing a drone to collect samples from the spray that comes from their blowholes. Ken Y. / CC by 2.0
By Jason Bruck
Human actions have taken a steep toll on whales and dolphins. Some studies estimate that small whale abundance, which includes dolphins, has fallen 87% since 1980 and thousands of whales die from rope entanglement annually. But humans also cause less obvious harm. Researchers have found changes in the stress levels, reproductive health and respiratory health of these animals, but this valuable data is extremely hard to collect.
<p>To better understand how people influence the overall health of dolphins, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Z9Z9u2EAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra" target="_blank">my colleagues and I</a> at Oklahoma State University's <a href="https://ceat.okstate.edu/usri/index.html" target="_blank">Unmanned Systems Research Institute</a> are developing a drone to collect samples from the spray that comes from their blowholes. Using these samples, we will learn more about these animals' health, which can aid in their conservation.</p><h2>The Old Ways Vs. the New Way</h2><p>Today, researchers wanting to measure wild dolphins' health primarily use remote biopsy darting – where researchers use a small dart to collect a sample of tissue – or handle the animals in order to collect samples. These methods don't physically harm the animals, but despite precautions, they can be disruptive and stressful for dolphins. Additionally, this process is challenging, time-consuming and expensive.</p><p>My current research focus is on <a href="https://integrativebiology.okstate.edu/8-people/faculty/449-jason-n-bruck" target="_blank">dolphin perception</a> – how they see, hear and sense the world. Using my experience, I am part of a team building a drone specifically designed to be an improvement over current sampling methods, both for dolphins and the researchers. Our goal is to develop a quiet drone that can fly into a dolphin's blind spot and collect samples from the mucus that is mixed with water and air sprayed out of a dolphin's blowhole when they exhale a breath. This is called the blow. Dolphins would experience less stress and teams could collect more samples at less expense.</p><p>Some researchers already use <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2017.00425" target="_blank">drones to sample blows from large and small whales</a>. But those animals are not easily startled and have huge blow fields that throw droplets far into the air and linger for a long time. Dolphin blows spray seawater, air and hormone-containing mucus from their blowholes at <a href="https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.126870" target="_blank">nearly 200 mph and last for about 0.3 seconds</a>. Additionally, dolphins may have <a href="https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.053397" target="_blank">better hearing than humans</a> and have eyes on both sides of their head that can see in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/0077-7579(72)90008-7" target="_blank">both air and water</a>. Good luck sneaking up on a dolphin.</p><p>Other teams have attempted to collect samples from dolphins using commercial drones, but it seems the animals' movements <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.2901" target="_blank">limit the success of these attempts with these devices</a>.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzQzNDQ3Ny9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY0NTExMzk0M30.q8ILIQEQ6WjIbiEL8GU5QdFo4OghqUZd65rWK0Y3svo/img.jpg?width=980" id="9cf25" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="455d3ece733c985bf44be661e61ac3b7" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Researchers work with trained dolphins to learn more about their sensory abilities, seen here testing a dolphin's hearing. Jason Bruck / CC BY-ND
A Lot to Learn From Hormones
<p>When sampling the blow, we are looking for hormones in mucus as these can be used to gauge psychological and physiological health. We are specifically interested in <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0114062" target="_blank">hormones like cortisol</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ygcen.2018.04.003" target="_blank">progesterone</a>, which indicate stress levels and reproductive ability respectively, but can also help determine overall health.</p><p>Additionally, blow samples can detect <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1128%2FmSystems.00119-17" target="_blank">respiratory pathogens</a> in the lungs or nasal passages - blowholes evolved from noses after all.</p><p>This health analysis is especially important in areas with oil spills as the chemicals can cause hormonal problems that harm <a href="https://www.carmmha.org/investigating-how-oil-spills-affect-dolphins-and-whales/" target="_blank">development, metabolism and reproduction</a> in dolphins.</p><p>Hormone samples can provide scientists with valuable data, but collecting them from intelligent and unpredictable animals is challenging.</p>Cetacean Collaborators
<p>To build a drone that can stealthily collect spray from moving dolphins, we needed more data on their eyesight and hearing, and this is data that couldn't be collected in the wild nor simulated in a lab.</p><p>We worked with dolphins at facilities like Dolphin Quest in Bermuda, which provides guests opportunities to learn about dolphins while allowing <a href="https://dolphinquest.com/about-us/our-story/" target="_blank">scientists access to animals for noninvasive research</a>. Here the dolphins can swim away if they choose not to work with us, so we had to design the study like a game; the way a kindergarten teacher entertains a class. If the dolphins aren't interested, we don't get to do the science.</p><p>Over the course of hundreds of sessions, we sought to answer two questions: What can dolphins hear and what can they see around their heads?</p><p>To test dolphin hearing, we set up microphones and cameras to record dolphin behavior as we played drone noise in the air. We analyzed the responses to each noise – such as how many dolphins looked at the speaker – and used these as a proxy for their ability to hear the sounds.</p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="5f31daf07a652b8d64a093b993ee4e96"><iframe lazy-loadable="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UjmQeH3vXHI?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>
<p>To test vision, we mounted lights inside a Hobermann sphere – the expandable rainbow plastic sphere you can see in the video above – that we can turn on and off. The dolphins were trained to whistle when they saw a light around their head. By turning on one light on at a time – which you can watch <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FAaV2Mc0uc" target="_blank">in this video</a> – we created a map of the dolphin's field of view.</p><p>Next, we needed to understand the blow and a means to practice drone flights without a dolphin. To do this, graduate students built robodolphin, which includes a mechanical dolphin lung and replica of the blowhole.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzQzNDQ4MC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwMjYwNTI5M30.WWrIKvwHJlnbYw5VTYq7XAsW6eFHwbqAT5pB4W_sJw8/img.jpg?width=980" id="b189f" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="235613c7e6de0dc00245273f341b5450" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Robodolphin doesn't look like a real dolphin, but it doesn't need to in order to train our drone pilots. C.J. Barton / Oklahoma State University / CC BY-ND
<p>To build robodolphin, we worked with dolphins trained to "chuff" or sneeze on command to measure spray characteristics. We used high-speed photography to see the dolphins' breath as it moved through the air. Then we conducted high resolution CT scans of a dolphin head and 3D-printed a replica of a nasal passage.</p><p>Now, we have a complete robodolphin and are tweaking its sprays to be nearly identical to the real thing. This will allow us to determine how close we need to get to collect the samples, and therefore, how quiet our drone needs to be.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzQzNDQ4Mi9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwMTYyNzQwM30.0GTCRzwomkJVp3A-L0Hi-bQElv-Y6dzkqDhOo1gKfYc/img.png?width=980" id="a16c8" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="8d4147a8a36627c51459a3a6d2c29888" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
The replica dolphin blowhole was designed from a scan of a real blowhole passage, and the spray it produces closely matches the real thing. Alvin Ngo, Mitch Ford and CJ Barton / Oklahoma State University / CC BY-ND
A Bit of Practice, Then Into the Wild
<p>In the next few months, we will test flights over robodolphin with existing drones to determine the timing and strategy for collection. From there, we will fabricate a low-noise drone that can fly fast enough and with sufficient maneuverability to capture samples from wild dolphins. Like a video game, we will use the visual field data to develop approach trajectories to stay in the visual blindspots.</p><p>We plan to test our drones on a truck-mounted robodolphin moving down a runway, then using a boat to simulate realistic conditions. The next steps will involve ocean testing with dolphins trained for open ocean swimming. These tests will determine if our devices can catch and hold the hormones as the drone flies back to a researcher's boat.</p><p>Finally, we will deploy the system to collect data on wild dolphins. Our first goal is to test resident dolphins – animals that live on the coasts and deal directly with boat and oil industry noise – which will allow us to learn more about stress resulting from human impacts.</p><p>Those samples are a way off, but if all goes well we will have a specially built drone capable of flying long distances and capturing samples undetected in a few years. The samples collected will allow researchers to do better science with impact on the animals they study.</p>From Your Site Articles
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