Ohioans who live near where a train filled with hazardous chemicals derailed last week were allowed to return home Wednesday, officials said. The evacuation order was lifted after air and water samples were analyzed overnight and deemed safe, East Palestine Fire Chief Keith Drabick told reporters at a press conference on Wednesday. The Norfolk Southern … Read more
Ongoing climate change driven by greenhouse gas emissions is often discussed in terms of global average warming. For example, the landmark Paris Agreement seeks to limit global warming to 1.5 ?C, relative to pre-industrial levels. However, the extent of future warming will not be the same throughout the planet. One of the clearest regional differences … Read more
In two studies, researchers at the University of Turku in Finland have found that carbon sequestration and plant resilience as well as forage pasture yield can be increased through key adjustments in agricultural management. The results provide a roadmap for reducing pesticide loads in soils and the first steps towards increasing climate change mitigation while … Read more
Concerns are mounting among policymakers and utility companies amid the impact of severe weather on the nation’s electrical grids. In recent months, electrical grids in Texas have been tested to the point of near failure. So it seems like perfect timing that new research in the INFORMS journal Management Science identifies a new method that … Read more
Penguins constitute a fascinating family of flightless birds that, although somewhat clumsy on land, are extremely talented swimmers. Their incredible maneuverability in water has captivated biologists for decades, with the first hydrodynamic studies on their swimming dating back to the 1970s. Although a rare few studies have clarified some of the physics behind penguins’ dexterity, … Read more
A group of researchers recently modeled the transmission of COVID-19 within an isolation room at the Royal Brompton Hospital in London, U.K. Their goal was to explore the optimal room layout to reduce the risk of infection for health care staff. To accomplish this, they used an adaptive mesh finite-element computational fluid dynamics model to … Read more
The teeming life in the Southern Ocean, which encircles Antarctica, contributes to brightening the clouds that form there, according to a study published today in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. The clouds are bright because of their high density of water droplets, due in turn to a chain of atmospheric processes that eventually connects back to … Read more
“Citizen Science” gives interested citizens the chance to actively engage in scientific research. A citizen-science project conducted by AWI in the Arctic now shows just how successful this can be. In the course of five years, citizens who went on sailing cruises to the Arctic surveyed and collected plastic debris that had washed up on … Read more
Toxic chemicals were released into the air Monday from five derailed tanker cars after officials warned nearby residents to flee or remain in a potentially deadly situation. The controlled release of dangerous vinyl chloride from the five rail cars in danger of exploding came after Friday’s train derailment in a tiny Ohio village of East … Read more
A world first study reverses the idea that the bulk of life in the ocean is fuelled by photosynthesis via sunshine, revealing that many ocean microbes in fact get their energy from hydrogen and carbon monoxide. It has always been a mystery as to how microbes growing in deepest parts of the sea survive, with … Read more