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Environment

Assessing the health of an entire ocean is an 'extraordinarily ambitious agenda', says Prof. J Murray Roberts. Image credit - Hannah Roberts
interview | environment
06 February 2020

Q&A: To protect the Atlantic, we first need to understand it

The Atlantic Ocean is under threat from fishing, fossil fuel extraction and deep-sea mining, and the onus should be on these industries to prove that their exploitation is sustainable rather than requiring scientists to come up with reasons to protect it, says Professor J Murray Roberts, a marine biologist at the University of Edinburgh, UK.

Despite the flooding in November, Venice has introduced a number of measures – though not all are complete – making it something of a textbook case for how to tackle coastal erosion. Image credit - Antonio Careses, licensed under CC3
environment
28 January 2020

Why Venice is actually a textbook case for flood prevention

When the worst floods since 1966 submerged the city of Venice in November 2019, the blame was laid on its incomplete mobile flood gates. They have been under construction since 2003 but were not ready in time to save the Italian city. But elsewhere in the Venetian lagoon, there was a different story to tell. In 1966, the coastal sides of Lido and Pellestrina islands also flooded, but this time they didn’t.

The Polarstern is currently drifting in Arctic ice as part of a year-long research expedition to study climate change up close. Image credit - Alfred-Wegener-Institut / Esther Horvath, licenced under CC-BY 4.0
environment
27 January 2020

A day on the Polarstern: studying climate change up close

Sea ice researcher Dr Polona Itkin of UiT The Arctic University of Norway in Tromsø is currently aboard a research vessel spending one year trapped in Arctic sea ice to study climate change up close. On 20 January she spoke to Horizon from the ship, Polarstern, about working through the polar night, the shortcomings of satellite data and fending off polar bears.

The migration routes of wildebeest are being squeezed by human activity. Image credit - Jorge Tung/Unsplash
environment | frontier research
23 January 2020

Human-wildlife conflict threatens protected reserves in East Africa

Each year, more than a million wildebeest migrate across the grassy plains of the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania into Kenya’s Masai Mara National Reserve. But on the borders of these protected areas, human populations are increasing and wild ecosystems are struggling to survive in the face of development. Understanding these pressures is crucial for protecting people and wildlife, and to curb illegal activities such as poaching.

Scientists will have to drill at a depth of nearly 3km to retrieve some of the oldest ice that can tell us about the past and future of climate. Image credit - NASA/Michael Studinger
environment
20 January 2020

Deep Antarctic drilling will reveal climate secrets trapped in 1.5 million-year-old ice

An ambitious mission to drill into the Antarctic ice sheet to extract some of the oldest ice on the planet will provide vital clues about a mysterious shift in the behaviour of our planet’s climate.

Light-activated catalysts that can neutralise airborne pollutants are being embedded in paint with a view to cleaning up city air. Image credit - AM Technology
environment | industry | frontier research
16 January 2020

The paints that eat pollutants and heat homes

Applying a coat of paint on the walls of a house may soon help to heat it, saving energy and reducing CO2 emissions. It could also clean the air that we breathe, breaking down chemicals and pollutants, and eliminating harmful pathogens.

The region of High Mountain Asia, which includes the Karakoram mountain range, is known as the third pole of the Earth because of the scale of its ice fields. Image credit - Tahakhan021, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
environment | frontier research
13 January 2020

Studying Asian glaciers provides glimpse into future of extremes

Scientists may have solved a 25-year-old puzzle about the mysterious behaviour of certain glaciers in High Mountain Asia. In most of this region, they are shrinking; but in the northwest, they are growing.

Monitoring the larvae of doodlebugs could tell scientists how their activities fit with methane flux measurements. Image credit - Carolyn-Monika Görres
environment | frontier research
07 January 2020

Trees and doodlebugs emit methane – the question is, how?

Trees and insects may play a significant role in the emission of methane – a potent greenhouse gas – and improving our understanding of exactly how this happens could help in targeting more effective ways to fight global warming.

Glaciers are typically found close to where people live and changes can directly affect people's lives, says Prof. Kääb. Image credit - Andreas Kääb
interview | environment | frontier research
06 January 2020

'Most ice on Earth is very close to melting conditions'

We need to understand how glaciers are shrinking in order to better adapt to climate change impacts such as changes to water supply, landslides and avalanches, says Professor Andreas Kääb, a glacier expert from the University of Oslo in Norway. 

The 2020s should be a turning point where the world averts impending disaster, according to Sandrine Dixon-Declève. Image credit - Pxfuel, licensed under CC0
environment | health | social sciences | frontier research
02 January 2020

What’s the most urgent action we need to take in 2020?

Declaring a global planetary emergency, improving sub-volcanic imaging to predict eruptions and developing artificial intelligence that works for humans are some of the urgent actions and research that experts in different fields want to see in 2020.

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