B-files

— Woods Hole Research Centre debuts first-of-its-kind image mosaic — [28 Nov 2007] — Much of the discussion at the upcoming United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali, Indonesia, will focus on monitoring tropical deforestation and the critical role that remote sensing systems will play in the development of REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) mechanisms...
— Indonesia at risk: Climate change threatens people and nature — [28 Nov 2007] — The devastating impact of global warming is already evident in Indonesia and will likely worsen due to further human-induced climate change, warns WWF. The review from the global conservation organisation, Climate Change in Indonesia — Implications for Humans and Nature, highlights that annual rainfall in the world’s fourth most populous nation is already down by 2 to 3 per cent, and the seasons are changing...
— Climate change triggers wars and population decline — [26 Nov 2007] — Climate change may be one of the most significant threats facing humankind. A new study shows that long-term climate change may ultimately lead to wars and population decline. The study, published 19 November in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), revealed that as temperatures decreased centuries ago during a period called the Little Ice Age, the number of wars increased, famine occurred and the population declined...
— Engineers give industry a moth’s eye view — [26 Nov 2007] — When moths fly at night, their eyes need to capture all the light available. To do this, certain species have evolved nanoscopic structures on the surface of their eyes which allow almost no light to reflect off the surface and hence to escape...
— Kyoto not enough to curb climate change — [26 Nov 2007] — Kyoto was a valiant first attempt to tackle global carbon emissions, and support for the Kyoto Protocol is still needed in the international community, but it will not be enough to make a breakthrough with climate change...
— Reading the newspaper electronically saves the environment — [26 Nov 2007] — Reading the newspaper 30 minutes a day on e-paper instead of a regular newspaper is environmentally preferable. If you read a Web-based newspaper instead, you can only read for ten minutes to produce the same load on the environment. This has been calculated in a study at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden...
— Grubby filters for fresher water — [26 Nov 2007] — Scientists in Australia have discovered that the older the water filter the better when it comes to reducing the off-putting earthy taste of some tap water. Writing in the Inderscience publication International Journal of Environment and Waste Management, the team explains how bacteria that grow on particles in a sand filter effectively extract the compounds that produce the taste...
— Bees are the new silkworms — [23 Nov 2007] Moths and butterflies, particularly silkworms, are well known producers of silk. And we all know spiders use it for their webs. But they are not the only invertebrates who make use of the strength and versatility of silk...
— Arctic spring comes weeks earlier — [18 Jun 2007] In the Earth’s cold and icy far north, the harsh winters are giving way to spring weeks earlier than they did just a decade ago, researchers have reported in the new issue of Current Biology, published by Cell Press...
— Why are there so many more species of butterflies? — [4 Apr 2007] In a study appearing in the April issue of the American Naturalist, McPeek and Brown show that many insect groups like beetles and butterflies have fantastic numbers of species because these groups are so old. In contrast, less diverse groups, like mammals and birds, are evolutionarily younger...
— Maculinea caterpillars do not want to grow up — [19 Mar 2007] For many years, ecologists from the Centre of Environment and Hydrology (CEH) have investigated the ecology of Maculinea rebeli, a Lycaenid butterfly whose caterpillars live as parasites inside colonies of Myrmica ants, where they feed on regurgitations from the nurse ants. One of the peculiar features of this species’ ecology is that only about 25% of the caterpillars complete development within one year...
— The European lepidopterological society with a new site — [16 Mar 2007] The European society for the study of moths and butterflies launched today a new website. Societas Europaea Lepidopterologica was founded in 1976 with the aims of promoting collaboration among the lepidopterists of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa, and of promoting conservation of Lepidoptera and their habitats...
— Californian butterflies on the Internet — [5 Mar 2007] One of the largest butterfly databases in the world was opened to the public on 1 March 2007. Since 1972, Professor Arthur Shapiro of the Center for Population Biology and Section of Evolution and Ecology at UC Davis has counted butterflies at sites across northern California from sea level to the tree line, 9,000 feet up in the Sierra Nevada...
— New scientific portal launched — [12 Feb 2007] The Net Empire recently launched a new scientific portal, Science Centric. The main objective is to bring together in one place a wealth of information regarding natural sciences in a user-friendly site...