Changes to farming practices in rice paddies in China may have led to a decrease in methane emissions, and an observed decline in the rate that methane has entered the Earths atmosphere over the last 20 years, a NASA-funded study finds.
Changsheng Li, a professor of natural resources in the University of New Hampshires Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans, and Space, and lead author of the study, notes that in the early 1980s Chinese farmers began draining their paddies midw
Last April Swedish scientists discovered high levels of a potentially cancer-causing chemical called acrylamide in wide range of starch-containing foods that are fried or baked, particularly french fries, potato chips and crackers. The announcement received worldwide publicity. But at the time, no one knew where the acrylamide came from, how it was formed, or, indeed, if there is a link between acrylamide in food and cancer. The findings were quickly confirmed by the British Food Standards Agency. Ea
Pioneering new solvent systems which are recyclable and environmentally compatible have been developed by researchers at the University of Leicester.
The team, led by Drs Andy Abbott and David Davies, has developed a wide range of new solvents made from bulk commodity materials such as urea (a common fertiliser) and vitamin B4. These have been studied extensively in recent years as they offer a potentially clean way to carry out chemical processes. They are non-volatile whilst liquid over a
In a significant scientific advance, researchers at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory have identified or confirmed 490 proteins in human blood serum — nearly doubling the number of known serum proteins, according to a paper accepted for publication in the December issue of Molecular and Cellular Proteomics.
“We have performed the most extensive identification of proteins in serum to date,” said Joel Pounds, corresponding author and a PNNL staff scientist. “We s
The fact that many animal species, such as herds of antelope or shoals of fish, live together in herds is well understood: there is safety in numbers. Why limpets live together is a mystery, but ecologist Tim Theobalds thinks he has come up with the answer, and his findings could have important implications for their conservation and commercial collection.
Speaking at the British Ecological Society’s Winter Meeting, being held at the University of York on 18–20 December 2002, Theobalds of th
ESAs gamma-ray satellite, Integral, is fully operational. Today Integrals first ground-breaking images of the high-energy Universe were presented in Paris, France. Astronomers call such initial observations first-light images.
The high-energy Universe is a violent place of exploding stars and their collapsed remnants such as the ultra-compressed neutron stars and, at the most extreme, all-consuming black holes. These celestial objects create X-rays and gamma rays tha