Case study suggests new approach to urban water supply

If you live in the developed world, safe water is usually just a faucet-turn away. And yet, global warming, drought conditions, and population growth in coming decades could change that, ushering in an era of uncertain access to water.

Now an MIT-based research team has evaluated those potential problems and, based on a case study in Australia, suggested an alternate approach to water planning. In a new paper, the researchers find there is often a strong case for building relatively modest, incremental additions to water infrastructure in advanced countries, rather than expensive larger-scale projects that may be needed only rarely.

Air pollution linked to cardiovascular disease; air purifiers may lessen impact

Exposure to high levels of air pollution increased stress hormone levels and negative metabolic changes in otherwise healthy, young adults in a recent study conducted in China. Air purifiers appeared to lessen the negative effects, according to new research published in the American Heart Association’s journal Circulation.

Researchers focused on fine particulate matter (PM2.5) – a component of air pollution emitted from vehicles, factories, power plants, fires and smoking – because many studies have suggested this type of major air pollutant might lead to cardiovascular and metabolic health consequences, according to Haidong Kan, M.D., Ph.D., study author and professor of environmental health sciences at Fudan University in Shanghai, China.

Monkey Species Not Seen Alive for 80 Years Rediscovered in the Amazon

Scientists have rediscovered a species of monkey in the Brazilian Amazon not seen alive since 1936, according to reporting by Mongabay.

The species, the bald-faced Vanzolini saki, was first discovered along the Rio Eiru more than 80 years ago by Alfonzo Olalla, an Ecuadorian naturalist. But scientists had found no other living evidence of the monkey since then. Earlier this year, a team of seven primatologists, led by Laura Marsh of the Global Conservation Institute, began a three-month expedition aboard a boat through the Upper Jurua River and its tributaries to search for the missing monkey and survey other wildlife in the remote region of Brazil.

Lights, camera, CRISPR: Biologists use gene editing to store movies in DNA

Internet users have a variety of format options in which to store their movies, and biologists have now joined the party. Researchers have used the microbial immune system CRISPR–Cas to encode a movie into the genome of the bacterium Escherichia coli.

The technical achievement, reported on 12 July in Nature, is a step towards creating cellular recording systems that are capable of encoding a series of events, says Seth Shipman, a synthetic biologist at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts. While studying brain development, Shipman became frustrated by the lack of a technique to capture how cells in the brain take on distinct identities. This inspired him to explore the possibility of making cellular recorders.

NASA's Sees a Tightly Wound Typhoon Banyan

Satellite imagery from NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite showed powerful storms tightly would around Typhoon Banyan's center as it moved through the Pacific Ocean.

On Aug. 14 at 02:06 UTC (Aug. 13 at 10:06 p.m. EDT) the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite provided a visible look at Banyan. The visible image showed a tight concentration of strong thunderstorms around the center of circulation, but no eye was visible. However, microwave satellite imagery did reveal an eye.

Drone tech offers new ways to manage climate change

An innovation providing key clues to how humans might manage forests and cities to cool the planet is taking flight. Cornell researchers are using drone technology to more accurately measure surface reflectivity on the landscape, a technological advance that could offer a new way to manage climate change.

“When making predictions about climate change, it’s critical that scientists understand how much energy the earth is absorbing and retaining,” said Charlotte Levy, a doctoral candidate who presented a talk on her research at the annual Ecological Society of America meeting, in Portland, Oregon, Aug. 8.

Student's idea leads to Antarctic volcano discovery

An Edinburgh student has helped identify what may be the largest volcanic region on Earth.

Study Links Major Floods in North America and Europe to Multi-Decade Ocean Patterns

The number of major floods in natural rivers across Europe and North America has not increased overall during the past 80 years, a recent study has concluded. Instead researchers found that the occurrence of major flooding in North America and Europe often varies with North Atlantic Ocean temperature patterns.

Prehistoric marine worm caught prey with spines deployed from head

A team of scientists has identified a small marine predator that once patrolled the ocean floor and grabbed its prey with 50 spines deployed from its head.

Named Capinatator praetermissus, this ancient creature is roughly 10 centimetres long and represents a new species within the group of animals known as chaetognaths – small, swimming marine carnivores also known as arrow worms.

Ozone Treaty Taking a Bite Out of Us Greenhouse Gas Emissions

The Montreal Protocol, the international treaty adopted to restore Earth’s protective ozone layer in 1989, has significantly reduced emissions of ozone-depleting chemicals from the United States. In a twist, a new study shows the 30-year old treaty has had a major side benefit of reducing climate-altering greenhouse gas emissions from the U.S.

That’s because the ozone-depleting substances controlled by the treaty are also potent greenhouse gases, with heat-trapping abilities up to 10,000 times greater than carbon dioxide over 100 years.