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Crowning the "King of the Crops": Sequencing the White Guinea Yam Genome

An international collaboration involving the Earlham Institute, Norwich, UK, and the Iwate Biotechnology Research Centre, Japan, has for the first time provided a genome sequence for the white Guinea yam, a staple crop with huge economic and cultural significance on the African continent and a lifeline for millions of people.

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NASA Tracking Hurricane Maria on Bahamas Approach

NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite provided a look at Maria's temperatures to find the strongest sides of the storm, while NOAA's GOES satellite revealed the extent of the storm in a visible image as it moved toward the Bahamas.

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We must accelerate transitions for sustainability and climate change, experts say

We must move faster towards a low-carbon world if we are to limit global warming to 2 degrees C this century, experts have warned.

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Fires in Australia Pop Up in Places Already Burned

Fires that span across the Northern Territory and Western Australia appear to have broken out in areas that have already been burned in previous fires.  Areas that sport "burn scars", those areas that are a darker, almost red-brown color, are surrounded by fires that are anywhere from a few hours old to 7 days old.  The areas that are seven days old can be attributed to fires that spread but areas that are just a few hours old may be fires that have presumably been put out only to have them break out again.  The Northern Territory of Australia experienced a higher than normal amount of rain this past season allowing the plants and trees that fuel fires to become even more overgrown and subject to becoming fire fodder.

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NASA Measures Hurricane Maria's Torrential Rainfall, Sees Eye Re-open

Hurricane Maria has caused catastrophic flooding in Puerto Rico and left a wake of heavy rainfall that NASA measured using a fleet of satellites in space. NASA satellite imagery also saw Maria's eye close up as it tracked across Puerto Rico and re-open after its exit.

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A Sustainable Future Powered by Sea

Professor Tsumoru Shintake at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University (OIST) yearns for a clean future, one that is affordable and powered by sustainable energy. Originally from the high-energy accelerator field, in 2012 he decided to seek new energy resources—wind and solar were being explored in depth, but he moved toward the sea instead.

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New Way to Detect Heart Damage Caused by Chemotherapy

The high-tech scanning techniques were enabled by funding from the British Heart Foundation (BHF), and could reveal whether chemotherapy is damaging a person’s heart before any symptoms appear.

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Positive, Negative or Neutral, It All Matters: NASA Explains Space Radiation

Charged particles may be small, but they matter to astronauts. NASA’s Human Research Program (HRP) is investigating these particles to solve one of its biggest challenges for a human journey to Mars: space radiation and its effects on the human body.

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Hurricane Irma Erased 'Footprints of an Entire Civilization' on Barbuda, Prime Minister Tells UN

The Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, Gaston Alphonso Browne, told the United Nations General Assembly today that after the largest storm ever in the Atlantic Ocean, “the island of Barbuda is decimated; its entire population left homeless; and its buildings reduced to empty shells.”

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Breathing dirty air may harm kidneys

Outdoor air pollution has long been linked to major health conditions such as heart disease, stroke, cancer, asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. A new study now adds kidney disease to the list, according to researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and the Veterans Affairs (VA) St. Louis Health Care System.

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