February media highlights: Geology and GSA today
...es W. Vallance Rapid avalanches or flows of rocky debris occur episodically on mountain slopes and pose inc...croaches on steep terrain. Predictive modeling of debris flows and avalanches has been hindered, in part, by lack of a unified description of the governing p...Volcano helps meteorologists find answer to climate change mystery
...f sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere. The airborne debris became sulfate aerosols that resulted in cooler temperatures around the world, including the southeastern United States and eastern China. While looking at temperature data from both regions, the meteorologists found that, for all of 1992, the climat......tory, some four billion years ago, when rocky, icy debris in our solar system accreted to form the planets i...must have been spectacular collisions. Much of the debris would have resembled comets - dirty snowballs thought to be mostly slushy water surrounding a rocky ...For whales and seals the ocean is not blue
...s contain a larger amount of inorganic and organic debris (due to land-drainage and a richer flora), which preferentially scatters the shorter wavelengths. Hence the underwater light field is shifted to longer wavelengths and contains little blue. In these conditions, the loss of 'idle' blue cones may have ......nificant increases in the production of dead plant debris within the forest floor of the CO2-enriched plots. Because the CO2 used in the FACE treatment has less-than-normal concentrations of the carbon-13 isotope, the scientists could also employ isotope ratios as a marker to trace the chemical origins of ......ace gp120 and antibodies raised against this viral debris are ineffective against the intact virus. Thus, the shed viral proteins act as a decoy to divert the immune response from the virus itself. First identified in the bone marrow of a 31-year-old male who had been HIV positive without symptoms for si...New study shows that salmon 'feed' the very forests that nurture them
...n addition, the plants are a source of large woody debris which retain sediments and help create sheltered a...e researchers note that this means the large woody debris that is essential for in-stream habitat can be produced in less than a century along salmon rivers a...First global-scale assessment of biodiversity beneath our feet
... survey biodiversity in litter (the layer of plant debris on the soil surface) and its role in an important ecosystem function, decomposition. As part of the Global Litter Invertebrate Decomposition Experiment (GLIDE), last August and September the researchers placed mesh bags of leaf litter on the ground ...Chemical society convenes regional meeting in Santa Barbara, October 28-31
...d waste-impacted soils; and oil field construction debris that may have been buried during past operations....Crater makes an impact on three sessions at GSA
...ocean water were vaporized and millions of tons of debris were ejected into the atmosphere within minutes. Marine life was decimated, and a train of giant waves of seawater inundated the land, explains Powers, whose talk Structure and Composition of the Southwestern Margin of the Buried Chesapeake Bay Imp......ung patients dendritic cells capture blood-carried debris of normal cells that have died, Pascual said. Dead-cell components, she added, normally are removed by scavenger cells, and the immune system never encounters that waste. But this is not true in lupus patients, she said. It is that abnormal reaction ...Gender issues related to spaceflight: A NASA perspective
...ffects of gravity, the blood products and cellular debris usually stay confined to the pelvis. The development of endometriosis is multifaceted, but exposure of the pelvic peritoneum to menstrual blood products is thought to be the primary cause of its development.Endometriosis is also primarily a pelvic pr...The anti-inflammatory effect of apoptotic bodies
...laborators have argued, the clearance of apoptotic debris is not merely silent, but actually suppresses inflammation. These authors previously identified a major phagocytic receptor for apoptotic cells, the phosphatidylserine (PS) receptor (PSR), which binds a phospholipid that is usually restricted to the ...New contact-lens materials will revolutionize the industry, UT Southwestern researchers report
...cause they promote tear exchange, which washes out debris and allows more oxygen to reach the eye. For the past 20 years, ophthalmologists have warned the public against wearing contact lenses overnight because it could make them more susceptible to eye infections. According to the Contact Lens Institute, m...Ancient supernova may have triggered eco-catastrophe
...ottom. Knie had proposed that the iron isotope was debris from a recent supernova explosion that took place close to Earth. But astronomers had no plausible candidates for such a nearby explosion until Maz-Apellnizs work with the Scorpius-Centaurus association, which is also being presented at this weeks me...Environmentally friendly ways to nourish the 'flower of love'
...thods as irrigation management, mulching, pruning, debris removal, and organic and synthetic pesticides. They have published the book, Healthy Roses: Environmentally Friendly Ways to Manage Pests and Disorders in Your Garden and Landscape. Sometimes the use of chemicals cant be avoided, says Karlik. But by ...Rare fossilized tube feet suggest functional shift through time
...ed a shallow, muddy sea bottom was smothered by a debris flow. Buried in thick sediment, the animals corpse was protected from large scavengers. Over time, the fine-grained mud was transformed into slate, which was later quarried for roofing shingles. As millions of bacteria fed upon the decaying flesh, ...UCR scientists developing process to convert wet bio-waste into energy
...r from the process is expected to be a fine, inert debris or ash that could be mixed into such products as asphalt or other construction materials, Hackett said. The five wastewater plants at Eastern Municipal Water District produce about 130 tons per day of biosolid waste. If just that waste were run throu...Sea Grant News: Caulerpa, DNA water quality detectives, Kayaking in Maine
... by removing more than 64 tons of polluting marine debris from the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands-critical habitat for the endangered Hawaiian monk seal, the most endangered marine mammal in America today. Sanders, Chair of New York Sea Grant's Program Advisory Council, was cited for his longtime role in sup...... the shape of flakes, and the many small pieces of debris left by chimpanzees are similar to the stones left behind by some of our early ancestors in East Africa during a period called the "Oldowan". Moreover the number of stone pieces per m2, and the size of the stone clusters themselves mimic some assembl...