Bay Area Ecosystems Climate Change Consortium (BAECCC)

ScienceDaily: Earth & Climate News

05/18/2013 01:37 PM
Frogs, salamanders and climate change
Increasingly erratic rainfall patterns can lead to declines in southeastern frog and salamander populations, but protecting ponds can improve their plight.

05/18/2013 01:32 PM
Reading rock to understand how climate change unfolds
Geologists reads rock, looking for the natural rules that govern the Earth’s climate in the absence of human activity. New work is challenging many assumptions about the ways drastic climate change unfolds – and what to expect next.

05/17/2013 01:23 PM
Invasive species: 'away-field advantage' weaker than ecologists thought
For decades, ecologists have assumed the worst invasive species—such as brown tree snakes and kudzu—have an “away-field advantage.” They succeed because they do better in their new territories than they do at home. A new study reveals that this fundamental assumption is not nearly as common as people might think.

05/17/2013 08:27 AM
Genome sequence of Tibetan antelope sheds new light on high-altitude adaptation
How can the Tibetan antelope live at elevations of 4,000-5,000m on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau? Investigators now provide evidence of genetic factors that may be associated with the species' adaption to harsh highland environments.

05/17/2013 08:26 AM
New era of fisheries policy needed to secure nutrition for millions
A new study argues that for fisheries policies to be effective they must take in to account not just fish stock conservation and environmental issues, but also research data on the patterns and dynamics of fish trade, markets and user consumption.

05/17/2013 06:58 AM
Climate change may have little impact on tropical lizards: Study contradicts predictions of widespread extinction
Climate change may have little impact on many species of tropical lizards, contradicting a host of recent studies that predict their widespread extinction in a rapidly warming planet.

05/17/2013 06:58 AM
GPS solution provides three-minute tsunami alerts
Researchers have shown that, by using global positioning systems (GPS) to measure ground deformation caused by a large underwater earthquake, they can provide accurate warning of the resulting tsunami in just a few minutes after the earthquake onset. For the devastating Japan 2011 event the analysis of the GPS data and issue of a detailed tsunami alert would have taken no more than three minutes.

05/17/2013 06:57 AM
Agriculture in China predates domesticated rice: Discovery of ancient diet shatters conventional ideas of how agriculture emerged
Archaeologists have made a discovery in southern subtropical China which could revolutionize thinking about how ancient humans lived in the region. They have uncovered evidence for the first time that people living in Xincun 5,000 years ago may have practiced agriculture -- before the arrival of domesticated rice in the region.

05/17/2013 06:57 AM
First ever underwater university lectures
Students at the University of Essex have taken their lectures to a whole new level -- 18 metres under the sea in remote Indonesia to be precise.

05/16/2013 04:20 PM
Topography of Eastern Seaboard muddles ancient sea level changes
The distortion of the ancient shoreline and flooding surface of the US Atlantic Coastal Plain are the direct result of fluctuations in topography in the region and could have implications on understanding long-term climate change, according to a new study.

05/16/2013 04:20 PM
How should geophysics contribute to disaster planning?
Earthquakes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters often showcase the worst in human suffering – especially when those disasters strike populations who live in rapidly growing communities in the developing world with poorly enforced or non-existent building codes. Scientists now illustrate how nearly identical natural disasters can play out very differently depending on where they strike.

05/16/2013 02:57 PM
Team wins Cubesat berth to gather Earth energy imbalance measurements
A team of scientists has won a berth on a tiny satellite to explore one of NASA's most important frontiers in climate studies: the imbalance in Earth's energy budget and the extent to which fast-changing phenomena, like clouds, contribute to that imbalance.

05/16/2013 12:27 PM
Research into carbon storage in Arctic tundra reveals unexpected insight into ecosystem resiliency
When a doctoral student and her advisor went north not long ago to study how long-term warming in the Arctic affects carbon storage, they had made certain assumptions.

05/16/2013 12:25 PM
World's biggest ice sheets likely more stable than previously believed
A new study suggests that the previous connections scientists made between ancient shoreline height and ice volumes are erroneous and that perhaps our ice sheets were more stable in the past than we originally thought. The study found that the Earth's hot mantle pushed up segments of ancient shorelines over millions of years, making them appear higher now than they originally were millions of years ago.

05/16/2013 12:25 PM
World's melting glaciers making large contribution to sea rise
While 99 percent of Earth's land ice is locked up in the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, the remaining ice in the world's glaciers contributed just as much to sea rise as the two ice sheets combined from 2003 to 2009, says a new study.

05/16/2013 10:39 AM
Invasive 'crazy ants' are displacing fire ants in areas throughout southeastern U.S.
Invasive "crazy ants" are displacing fire ants in areas across the southeastern United States, according to researchers at The University of Texas at Austin. It's the latest in a history of ant invasions from the southern hemisphere and may prove to have dramatic effects on the ecosystem of the region.

05/16/2013 10:36 AM
Low-grade cotton offers more ecologically-friendly way to clean oil spills
When it comes to cleaning up the next massive crude oil spill, one of the best and most eco-friendly solutions for the job may be low-grade cotton from West Texas.

05/16/2013 10:36 AM
Coral reef fishes prove invaluable in the study of evolutionary ecology
Coral reef fish species have proven invaluable for experimental testing of key concepts in social evolution and already have yielded insights about the ultimate reasons for female reproductive suppression, group living, and bidirectional sex change.

05/16/2013 08:56 AM
Moth-inspired nanostructures take the color out of thin films
Inspired by the structure of moth eyes, researchers have developed nanostructures that limit reflection at the interfaces where two thin films meet, suppressing the "thin-film interference" phenomenon commonly observed in nature. This can potentially improve the efficiency of thin-film solar cells and other optoelectronic devices.

05/16/2013 08:52 AM
Spiders: Capturing prey in silken netting and sticky hairs
The great ecological success of spiders is often substantiated by the evolution of silk and webs. Biologists have now found an alternative adaptation to hunting prey: hairy adhesive pads, so called scopulae.