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Categories: Archaeology: General, Environmental: Ecosystems

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A four-year study concludes that the fungal disease, white-nose syndrome, poses a severe threat to many western North American bats.

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Grasslands are managed worldwide to support livestock production, while remaining natural or semi-natural ones provide critical services that contribute to the wellbeing of both people and the planet. Human activities are however causing grasslands to become a source of greenhouse gas emissions rather than a carbon sink. A new study uncovered how grasslands used by humans have changed our climate over the last centuries.

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Over 40 years of monitoring, an endangered bunchgrass prairie became hotter, drier and more susceptible to fire annually -- but dramatic seasonal changes (not annual climate trends) seem to be driving the biggest changes in plant production, composition, and summer senescence.

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Air pollution experts have found that green infrastructure (GI), such as trees, can help reduce temperatures in many of Europe's cities and towns.

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Recent cave exploration has turned up a tiny, top-heavy snail that glistens under the light of the microscope lens. Only 1.80 mm tall, this transparent snail bulges at the middle, giving a natural appearance to the ''muffin-top'' waistline. The article reveals new biodiversity from the seldom explored caves of central Laos.

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Diversifying agricultural systems beyond a narrow selection of crops leads to a range of ecosystem improvements while also maintaining or improving yields, according to a new study that analyzed thousands of previously conducted experiments. Diversification practices such as crop rotations and planting prairie strips can lead to 'win-win' results that protect the environment without sacrificing yields, according to the analysis.

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A 14,000-year paleoecological reconstruction of the sub-Antarctic islands done by an international research team including HKU has found that seabird establishment occurred during a period of regional cooling 5,000 years ago. Their populations, in turn, shifted the Falkland Island ecosystem through the deposit of high concentrations of guano that helped nourish tussac, produce peat and increase the incidence of fire.

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Mega-droughts - droughts that last two decades or longer - are tipped to increase thanks to climate change, according to new research.

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When startled, do all fish respond the same way? A few fish, like Mexican cavefish, have evolved in unique environments without any predators. To see how this lack of predation impacts escape responses that are highly stereotyped across fish species, scientists explored this tiny fish to determine if there are evolved differences in them. Findings reveal that the dramatic ecological differences between cave and river environments contribute to differences in escape behavior in blind cavefish and river-dwelling surface cavefish.

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A study finds that atmospheric dust levels are rising across the Great Plains at a rate of up to 5% per year. The trend of rising dust parallels expansion of cropland and even seasonal crop cycles. And if the Great Plains becomes drier, a possibility under climate change scenarios, then all the pieces are in place for a repeat of the Dust Bowl that devastated the Midwest in the 1930s.

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Researchers focused on the stability of tropical rainforests in the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania. With their approach they were able to explore how rainforests respond to changing rainfall.

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Amazonia is closer to a catastrophic ecological tipping point than any time in the last 100,000 years, and human activity is the cause.

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As Arctic summers warm, Earth's northern landscapes are changing. Using satellite images to track global tundra ecosystems over decades, a new study found the region has become greener, as warmer air and soil temperatures lead to increased plant growth.

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An international team of scientists has identified at least 11 species of fish suspected to have land-walking abilities.

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Using Greenland ice cores, new research is the first to confirm the longstanding assumption that climate changes between the tropics and the Arctic were synchronized during the last glacial period.

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Subsurface cavities created by lava on Mars and the Moon could provide a shield against cosmic radiation, new research suggests.

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Volcanologists working on remote islands in the Galápagos Archipelago has found that volcanoes which reliably produce small basaltic lava eruptions hide chemically diverse magmas in their underground plumbing systems - including some with the potential to generate explosive activity. These volcanoes might undergo unexpected changes to sudden such activity in the future.

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Ancient climate records from Leviathan Cave, located in the southern Great Basin, show that Nevada was even hotter and drier in the past than it is today, and that one 4,000-year period in particular may represent a true, ''worst-case'' scenario picture for the Southwest and the Colorado River Basin -- and the millions of people who rely on its water supply.

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A cave in a remote part of Mexico was visited by humans around 30,000 years ago - 15,000 years earlier than people were previously thought to have reached the Americas. Excavations of Chiquihuite Cave, located in a mountainous area in northern Mexico controlled by drugs cartels, uncovered nearly 2000 stone tools from a small section of the high-altitude cave. Analysis of the sediment in the cave uncovered a new story of the colonisation of the Americas.

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According to paleoclimatic reconstructions analyzing stalagmites sampled in some caves in the Murge plateau (Apulia, Italy), Neanderthals might have become extinct because Homo sapiens employed more sophisticated hunting technologies.