The Australian government has agreed to invest almost $53 million in a north Tasmanian company that will upgrade its coal-fired kiln to burn wood "waste" and used tires for cement manufacturing.
Like humans, wildlife is increasingly vulnerable as climate change fuels longer and more intense heat waves, disrupting feeding and breeding and, in extreme cases, proving fatal.
Much of Western Europe was sweltering in a grueling heat wave on Friday, with the mercury expected to continue rising in the coming days, likely shattering yet more temperature records.
Danish companies emit less CO₂ when they relocate certain tasks abroad. At the same time, emissions rise correspondingly in those countries. However, global emissions increase when companies are under pressure from cheap imports from China. This is shown by new research from the University of Copenhagen.
Need some good news on a Friday after a long week? The Earth may not be engulfed by the expanding fireball of the dying sun, which has long been assumed to be our home planet's ultimate fate, according to scientists.
A new study from Caltech demonstrates that soil bacteria can adapt under stress, particularly when a key nutrient, phosphorus, is running low in their environment. The work is important for understanding the complex relationships between microorganisms and the roots of plants, which has implications for soil health and food sustainability as the climate changes.
New antibiotic candidates for drug-resistant bacteria may reside inside prions, misfolded proteins in the brain best known for rare and fatal degenerative brain diseases. Prion and prion-like proteins may hide short peptides, called "prionins," that can kill bacteria, suggesting proteins best known for their role in neurodegeneration may contain molecular features linked to immune defense, according to new research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
Can tiny aerosol particles make tropical convective clouds grow stronger? For decades, scientists have debated this question because aerosols can change how cloud droplets form, grow and release latent heat. One proposed pathway, known as condensational aerosol convective invigoration, requires clouds to contain high water-vapor supersaturation. Under such conditions, adding aerosol particles can create many new droplets, enhance condensation, release additional latent heat and potentially strengthen convective updrafts.
An international research team from Tohoku University, Tokyo University of Science, Vanderbilt University and the University of Adelaide has discovered a novel, exceptionally simple method to precisely synthesize extremely small iridium nanoclusters in ambient air. Such a feat was previously considered highly challenging. In addition, the nanoclusters outperform conventional, commercially available iridium catalysts by 1.5 times in mass activity, while maintaining sustained operational stability without degradation for more than 20 hours.
A stunningly concentrated and hefty galaxy cluster, from a time in the universe's history when such massive structures aren't expected to have fully formed yet, is challenging cosmic evolution theories. Across a series of three recent papers, a team led by researchers from IPAC—a science and data center for astrophysics and planetary science at Caltech—have revealed that the cluster is the most distant example of strong gravitational lensing with a galaxy cluster.
