The cruise ship industry should be subject to global monitoring and effective legislation because of its continuous increasing impact on both the environment and human health and wellbeing, according to new research. The review finds that cruising is a major source of environmental pollution and degradation, with air, water, soil, fragile habitats and areas and…

Researchers in Japan have established sustainable cell lines in a coral — a success which could prove to be a pivotal moment for gaining a deeper understanding of the biology of these vital marine creatures. Seven out of eight cell cultures, seeded from the stony coral, Acropora tenuis, have continuously proliferated for over 10 months.…

Core samples taken from a stand of old growth Douglas-fir trees in the South Beach area just south of Newport showed reduced growth following the 9.0 earthquake and subsequent tsunami that struck the Pacific Northwest in 1700. The physical evidence from the Douglas-fir tree rings confirms modeling that depicts the reach of the January 1700…

A ‘smart’ system that controls the storage and release of energy from wind turbines will reduce the risk of power cuts and support the increase of wind energy use world-wide, say researchers. The system uses the variable speed of the rotors in wind turbine systems to more closely regulate the supply of power to the…

Scientists created a model system to experimentally study tiny bacteria called TM7 and provide empirical data to confirm a hypothesis for how the bacteria adapted to live inside humans. Among the diverse bacterial species living within our mouths is a group belonging to the Candidate Phyla Radiation (CPR). These bugs are especially mysterious because they…

Scientists placed honey bee hives next to soybean fields in Iowa and tracked how the bees fared over the growing season. To their surprise, the bees did well for much of the summer. The colonies thrived and gained weight. But in August, the trend reversed. By mid-October, most of the honey was gone and the…

The now-familiar sight of traditional propeller wind turbines could be replaced in the future with wind farms containing more compact and efficient vertical turbines. New research has found that the vertical turbine design is far more efficient than traditional turbines in large scale wind farms, and when set in pairs the vertical turbines increase each…

A new hydrocarbon study contradicts conventional wisdom about how methane is trapped in rock, revealing a new strategy to more easily access the valuable energy resource. «The most challenging issue facing the shale energy industry is the very low hydrocarbon recovery rates: less than 10 percent for oil and 20 percent for gas. Our study…

Scientists describe development of a cost-effective Scotch-tape-like film that can be applied to perovskite solar cells and capture 99.9% of leaked lead in the event of solar cell damage. In an Oct. 28 brief communication to the journal Nature Sustainability, the scientists describe development of a cost-effective Scotch-tape-like film that can be applied to PSCs…

Researchers have developed a dielectrophoresis (DEP) enabled MicroelectroFluidic Probe (MeFP) that has the ability to sequentially separate and pattern mammalian cells in an open microfluidic system. The study demonstrated the MeFP with up to 100% isolation efficiency, 90% separation purity, and a pattern deposition rate of a few seconds. Using this method to sort, purify,…