Новости за 27.07.2021

Ask a farmer, a scientist, and a conservation professional to define soil health, and you might come up with three rather different answers. That mismatch may be at the root of lower-than-ideal adoption of soil conservation practices, according to a new study from the University of Illinois and The Ohio State University.

A new study found more U.S. high school students felt respected in a political discussion designed as a deliberation—where the goal was to reach consensus—than in a group debate, and their views also moved closer toward agreement. Students engaged in group debate were generally more polarized after the activity.

It's not the look in her compound eyes or the shape of her carapace that really attracts the male cockroach to his mate. Instead, it's all those 29-carbon hydrocarbons in her cuticle that drive him wild. How the female cockroach regulates production of these contact sex pheromones, and what happens when she produces too few, is the subject of a new study publishing on July 27th in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Tong-Xian Liu of Northwest A&F University in Yangling, China, and colleagues.

The discovery of antibiotics was a huge breakthrough in medicine, which helped save countless lives. Unfortunately, their widespread use has led to the rapid evolution of highly resistant bacterial strains, which threaten to take humanity back to square one in the fight against infectious diseases. Even though researchers are seeking new design concepts for antibacterial drugs, the overall development of new agents is currently on the decline.

Madagascar is renowned for its unique and varied biodiversity, which spans dry grasslands, wet rain forests, mangroves and deserts. This variety, combined with the island's isolation and size, has fostered distinctive assemblages of plants and animals, including the country's famous lemurs and baobab trees.

Chile's Chinchorro mummies, the oldest in the world to have been purposefully preserved by humans, were added to UNESCO's World Heritage List on Tuesday.

International drilling efforts over the last decades into the seafloor have provided increasing evidence for the existence of an extensive deep biosphere below the seafloor. There, circulating fluids in the sub-seafloor deliver chemical compounds from which energy is produced to fuel microbial life in such deep ecosystems. Our understanding of the role of such chemolithotrophic microbes in the continental deep biosphere, however, is much more limited due to poor accessibility.

In an analysis of over 19,500 orphaned oil and gas wells across the United States, scholars at Resources for the Future (RFF) find that the median cost of plugging and reclaiming a well is $76,000, although that figure can vary widely depending on the age, location, well depth, and other key factors.

Every year, 3.5 million metric tons of sodden diapers end up in landfills.

On Monday, the air quality in Boston and the greater New England area was so bad that it was only rivaled by the areas in Northern California and Oregon currently on fire. An interactive map from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration showed how smoke from the wildfires out west were being carried across the continental US by winds and the jet stream. In response to the blanket of smoke engulfing the commonwealth's skies, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection issued an air quality alert.

Adding lead and calcium to an industrial catalyst dramatically improves its ability to support propylene production at very high temperatures, making it stable and active for a month.

The demand for energy consumption, limited availability of fossil fuels, and pollution caused by the energy production industry challenge scientists to find new, more cost-effective, and greener solutions to produce power. Most of the current energy sources are far from being environmentally friendly. In this context, electrochemically assisted generation of chemicals, at first glance, would not be suspected to have any tremendous potential to be applied in this sector.

From art to religion to land use, much of what is deemed valuable in the United States was shaped centuries ago by the white male perspective. Fish, it turns out, are no exception.

Based on the principle of interaction between matter and light, a new method has been developed to track and observe the Brownian motion of fast-moving nanometer-sized molecules, and measure the different fluorescence signals of each biological nanoparticle.

A toddler who was found dead in Oregon 58 years ago has finally been identified, thanks to a concerted effort involving local, state and national law enforcement, genetic genealogists and a University of Oregon scientist.

In recent years, wildfires on the West Coast have become larger and more damaging. A combination of almost a century of fire suppression and hotter and drier conditions has created a tinderbox ready to ignite, destroying homes and polluting the air over large areas.

As COVID-19 restrictions begin to ease and people return to the workplace this fall, many young children will return to child care centers, preschools and family child care homes. The University of Illinois Chicago's College of Education is reminding caregivers that they have available free online resources for both early math and early science education.

Nostalgia, defined as a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, has become a growing focus of research in personality and social psychology. Though it may seem counterintuitive, nostalgia has been proven to be a great motivator of future behavior. Take for example, fans of former President Barack Obama. When the 2016 election of President Donald Trump left over half of the United States' electorate reeling, it contributed to nostalgia for the days of President Obama (and his administration), even among some conservatives.

When was the last time you watched a DVD? If you're like most people, your DVD collection has been gathering dust as you stream movies and TV from a variety of on-demand services. But have you ever considered the impact of streaming video on the environment?

A new study finds that adults in five Southern cities hold similar views regarding school assignments and the importance of diversity in K-12 schools—despite those cities having very different policies in place to support socioeconomic diversity in their school systems.

Within just 45 years south eastern English pronunciations will be used across the UK, according to new research from the Universities of Portsmouth and Cambridge.

The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on our society are only starting to be understood and will be studied for decades to come, but social media can offer an early glimpse.

Community-led monitoring of deforestation might not reduce forest use overall, but merely displace it to unmonitored areas, a new study finds.

When a tissue experiences inflammation, its cells remember. Pinning proteins to its genetic material at the height of inflammation, the cells bookmark where they left off in their last tussle. Next exposure, inflammatory memory kicks in. The cells draw from prior experience to respond more efficiently, even to threats that they have not encountered before. Skin heals a wound faster if it was previously exposed to an irritant, such as a toxin or pathogen; immune cells can attack new viruses after... Читать дальше...

A team of researchers at the University of Vienna has found that dogs can sometimes tell when people are lying to them. In their paper published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the group describes experiments they conducted with hundreds of dogs, and what was learned about their ability to detect deception in unknown people.