Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Climate change is making Indian monsoon seasons more chaotic      (via sciencedaily.com) 

If global warming continues unchecked, summer monsoon rainfall in India will become stronger and more erratic. This is the central finding of an analysis by a team of researchers that compared more than 30 state-of-the-art climate models from all around the world. The study predicts more extremely wet years in the future - with potentially grave consequences for more than one billion people's well-being, economy, food systems and agriculture.

Environmental: Ecosystems Geoscience: Environmental Issues
Published

Ozone pollution harms maize crops, study finds      (via sciencedaily.com) 

A new study has shown that ozone in the lower layers of the atmosphere decreases crop yields in maize and changes the types of chemicals that are found inside the leaves.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Low risk of researchers passing coronavirus to North American bats      (via sciencedaily.com) 

A new study finds that the risk is low that scientists could pass coronavirus to North American bats during winter research.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Study finds microbial-plant interactions affect the microbial response to climate change      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Biologists have discovered that plants influence how their bacterial and fungal neighbors react to climate change. This finding contributes crucial new information to a hot topic in environmental science: in what manner will climate change alter the diversity of both plants and microbiomes on the landscape?

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

The persistent danger after landscape fires      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Every year, an estimated four percent of the world's vegetated land surface burns, leaving more than 250 megatons of carbonized plants behind. A study has now recorded elevated concentrations of environmentally persistent free radicals (EPFR) in these charcoals - in some cases even up to five years after the fire. These EPFR may generate reactive substances, which in turn harm plants and living organisms.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Ancient megafaunal mutualisms and extinctions as factors in plant domestication      (via sciencedaily.com) 

The development of agriculture is often thought of as a human innovation in response to climate change or population pressure. A new manuscript challenges that concept, suggesting that plants that had already evolved adaptive traits for life among large-bodied grazing and browsing animals were more likely to prosper on a highly disturbed anthropogenic landscape.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Greenland caves: Time travel to a warm Arctic      (via sciencedaily.com) 

An international team of scientists presents an analysis of sediments from a cave in northeast Greenland, that cover a time period between about 588,000 to 549,000 years ago. This interval was warmer and wetter than today, the cave deposits provide an outlook in a possible future warmer world due to climate change.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

How grasslands respond to climate change      (via sciencedaily.com) 

The rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration and concurrent climate change has led to yield reductions of grass-rich grassland vegetation in the past century.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Last Ice Age: Precipitation caused maximum advance of Alpine Glaciers      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Geologists unexpectedly found mineral deposits in former ice caves in the Austrian Alps dating back to the peak of the last ice age. These special calcite crystals demonstrate that intensive snowfall during the second half of the year triggered a massive glacier advance leading to the climax of the last ice age.

Computer Science: Encryption
Published

Facial recognition ID with a twist: Smiles, winks and other facial movements for access      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Concurrent Two-Factor Identity Verification requires both one's facial identity and a specific facial motion to gain access. To set it up, a user faces a camera and records a short 1-2 second video of either a unique facial motion or a lip movement from reading a secret phrase. The video is then input into the device, which extracts facial features and the features of the facial motion, storing them for later ID verification.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Whooping cranes steer clear of wind turbines when selecting stopover sites      (via sciencedaily.com) 

An article reports that whooping cranes migrating through the U.S. Great Plains avoid 'rest stop' sites that are within 5 km of wind-energy infrastructure.

Computer Science: Encryption
Published

Researchers discover that privacy-preserving tools leave private data anything but      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Researchers explored whether private data could still be recovered from images that had been 'sanitized'' by such deep-learning discriminators as privacy protecting GANs (PP-GANs).

Computer Science: Encryption
Published

Heat-free optical switch would enable optical quantum computing chips      (via sciencedaily.com) 

In a potential boost for quantum computing and communication, a European research collaboration reported a new method of controlling and manipulating single photons without generating heat. The solution makes it possible to integrate optical switches and single-photon detectors in a single chip.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Rarest seal breeding site discovered      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Scientists have discovered a previously unknown breeding site used by the world's rarest seal species.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Metal whispering: Finding a better way to recover precious metals from electronic waste      (via sciencedaily.com) 

With a bit of 'metal whispering,' engineers have developed technology capable of recovering pure and precious metals from the alloys in our old phones and other electrical waste. All it takes is the controlled application of oxygen and relatively low levels of heat.

Computer Science: Encryption Mathematics: Puzzles
Published

Laser system generates random numbers at ultrafast speeds      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Scientists have developed a system that can generate random numbers over a hundred times faster than current technologies, paving the way towards faster, cheaper, and more secure data encryption in today's digitally connected world.

Computer Science: Encryption
Published

Quantum systems learn joint computing      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Researchers realize quantum-logic computer operation between two separate quantum modules in different laboratories.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Dingo effects on ecosystem visible from space      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Satellite images taken over three decades show that keeping dingoes out comes at a price.

Environmental: Ecosystems
Published

Impacts of climate warming on microbial network interactions      (via sciencedaily.com) 

A new study explores the impacts of climate warming on microbial network complexity and stability, providing critical insights to ecosystem management and for projecting ecological consequences of future climate warming.

Computer Science: Encryption
Published

Quantum computing: When ignorance is wanted      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Quantum technologies for computers open up new concepts of preserving the privacy of input and output data of a computation. Scientists have shown that optical quantum systems are not only particularly suitable for some quantum computations, but can also effectively encrypt the associated input and output data.