147 news posts in Environment

Environment

13 Oct 2022

From chili-heat pain relief to blue whale migration: 5 Frontiers articles you won’t want to miss

by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image: Shutterstock.com At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, many often fly under the radar. Here are just five amazing papers you may have missed. Chili to the rescue: Modulating capsaicin as a treatment for chronic itching Pain and itching are both signals that help humans protect themselves, by prompting us to end contact with whatever causes us pain or make us itch. However, they are also key symptoms of many disorders, and can be frustratingly difficult to treat. Scientists from the Universidad Miguel Hernández, writing in Frontiers in Molecular Neuroscience, investigated whether transient receptor potential channels, which pick up sensory cues ranging from the taste of wasabi to changes in pH, could help treat pain and itching. Previous attempts to exploit these channels to stop pain and itching have not been successful because they cause overheating as a side effect, so the authors suggested that ‘soft’ modulation of the channels might be more patient-friendly, targeting only the channels that aren’t working correctly. While there are several existing medications which use capsaicin to target these channels, […]

Environment

12 Oct 2022

The ultimate death stare: How moth wing patterns scare off predatory birds with amazing optical illusion

by Dr Hannah Rowland, Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, and Dr John Skelhorn, Newcastle University Image: Dr Hannah Rowland Many prey species have eyespot markings that are believed to ward off predators. But how, and does a predator’s angle of approach make them less effective? Dr Hannah Rowland and Dr John Skelhorn write for Frontiers about their research, published today in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, into how these protective patterns on moth wings convince birds it’s not worth attacking the insects. How art mirrors life when it comes to moth wings Have you ever felt that a person in a portrait is watching you, their eyes following you about a room? This optical illusion is known as the Mona Lisa effect, after Leonardo da Vinci’s famously enigmatic painting. When artists paint their sitter’s eyes with the pupils perfectly centered, no matter where visitors stand – to the left, right, or in front of the painting – eye contact is guaranteed. Nature seems to have hit upon the same idea. But in the animal kingdom it can be a matter of life or death. Many species of fish, butterflies, moths, praying mantids, and beetles have paired circular markings on […]

Environment

23 Sep 2022

Ancient Maya cities were dangerously contaminated with mercury

By Mischa Dijkstra, Frontiers science writer Temple of the Great Jaguar at Tikal, a UNESCO world heritage site in Guatemala. Image credit: Leonid Andronov,/ Shutterstock.com A new review shows that the soil in the cities of the ancient Maya are heavily polluted with mercury. As vessels filled with mercury and objects painted with cinnabar have been found at many Maya sites, the authors conclude that the Maya were heavy users of mercury and mercury-containing products. This resulted in severe and dangerous pollution in their day, which persists even today. The cities of the ancient Maya in Mesoamerica never fail to impress. But beneath the soil surface, an unexpected danger lurks there: mercury pollution. In a review article in Frontiers in Environmental Science, researchers conclude that this pollution isn’t modern: it’s due to the frequent use of mercury and mercury-containing products by the Maya of the Classic Period, between 250 and 1100 CE. This pollution is in places so heavy that even today, it poses a potential health hazard for unwary archeologists. Lead author Dr Duncan Cook, an associate professor of Geography at the Australian Catholic University, said: “Mercury pollution in the environment is usually found in contemporary urban areas and […]

Environment

23 Sep 2022

Bees, blue light, and bacteria in beetles’ ‘back pockets’: Most viewed articles of August 2022

Image: Shutterstock.com by Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Each month, Frontiers shines a spotlight on some of the leading research across a wide range of topics. Here are just some of the highlights that resonated strongly with readers on our news site in the month of August. 1. Modern pesticides make it hard for bees to keep on the straight and narrow Research published in Frontiers in Insect Science showed that common pesticides affected bees’ brains so that they couldn’t orient themselves properly. Bees exposed to sulfoxaflor and imidacloprid were tested on their ability to respond to stimuli that tricked them into thinking they’d been blown off course, a situation which required them to use their optomotor response to reorient themselves. Compared to control bees, they performed very poorly, reacting inappropriately or not at all to the stimuli. The problem seems to be caused by damage to the nervous system, but the exact mechanism is unclear. Since bees need this optomotor response to travel between different sources of pollen, and since these insecticides are widely used, this is a source of significant concern. The authors tested the optomotor response in walking bees rather than flying bees, so further research […]

Environment

12 Sep 2022

Scientists eavesdrop on minke whale ‘boing’ calls in Hawai’i, and 4 other articles you don’t want to miss

By Angharad Brewer Gillham, Frontiers science writer Image: Annie Leblanc/Shutterstock.com At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, many often fly under the radar. Here are just five amazing papers you may have missed. Scientists eavesdrop on minke whale conversations in Hawai’i Scientists writing in Frontiers in Marine Science used hydrophones to study hard-to-spot minke whales in Hawai’i, learning that they use their ‘boing’ calls more frequently when they are close to other members of the same species. Minke whales who visit this area are hard to study because they are small, solitary, and visit outside the times when most ship-based surveys are conducted. Passive acoustic monitoring, using hydrophones mounted on the sea bed, allows scientists to listen in on whales all year round. The authors used 47 hydrophones to record thousands of calls between 2012 and 2017. These calls were analyzed to detect individual whales and monitor their behavior in the study area. The minke whales used their ‘boing’ calls only between fall and spring, and called more rapidly when other minke whales were nearby. Because minke whales are so enigmatic, it isn’t […]

Environment

17 Aug 2022

Modern pesticides damage the brain of bees so they can’t move in a straight line

By Mischa Dijkstra, Frontiers science writer Image: Shutterstock.com Researchers show for the first time that honeybee foragers exposed to the pesticides sulfoxaflor and imidacloprid have an impaired optomotor response, which makes them poor at keeping themselves on a straight trajectory while moving. This impairment is accompanied by damage to brain cells and dysregulation of detoxification genes. These results add to the growing evidence that modern pesticides are highly damaging to beneficial insects like bees. The challenge to let people walk back and forth in a straight line isn’t just used by police to test if drivers are intoxicated: it’s also used by neurologists to diagnose neurological disorders like ataxia, where parts of the brain that coordinate movement are impaired. Now, researchers use an insect version of this challenge to show for the first time that modern pesticides damage the nervous system of honeybees so that it becomes hard for them to walk in a straight line. The results are published in Frontiers in Insect Science. “Here we show that commonly used insecticides like sulfoxaflor and the neonicotinoid imidacloprid can profoundly impair the visually guided behavior of honeybees. Our results are reason for concern because the ability of bees to respond […]

Environment

09 Aug 2022

Traces of 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill still detectable in 2020

By K.E.D. Coan, science writer Image: Breck P. Kent/Shutterstock.com Small amounts of highly weathered oil residues from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster were still present in the surroundings ten years later, shows a new report. Crude oil is a complex mixture with many components that undergo chemical reactions in the environment. These transformed chemicals, as well as longer persisting oil products, can impact local ecosystems and a better understanding of the fates of these molecules can help future clean-up efforts. The oil spilled during the Deepwater Horizon disaster in 2010 was largely transformed by the end of that summer, reports a new study in Frontiers in Marine Science. But some small quantities of chemical residues still persisted in the environment even ten years later. This latest study follows the varied fates of the leaked petroleum components, providing important insights for future spills and clean-up efforts. “The better we understand the chemicals and their chemical reactive properties as well as their physical properties, the better we will be able to mitigate oil spills and understand and detect environmental damages from oil spills,” said first author Prof Edward Overton of Louisiana State University. “Our paper describes the most abundant chemicals that make […]

Environment

20 Jul 2022

Heat wave: article collections on the global impact of rising temperatures

As the temperature rises this summer, we have gathered our top article collections on how heat effects us and the planet. With collective views of over 1 million, researchers were fired up by topics spanning from plant heat stress and weather extremes in the urban environment to marine heatwaves and human heat acclimation. Article collections: Wild fires 16 articles | 104,000 views Addressing our current understanding of wildland fires, with a specific focus on engineering approaches to mitigate the harmful effects of fires Human heat acclimation 13 articles | 95,000 views Recent advances in our understanding of the physiological mechanisms underlying the adaptive process in vulnerable populations, and whether heat acclimation is beneficial for all populations Marine heatwaves 23 articles | 285,000 views A comprehensive overview of current research on marine heatwaves from across the range of marine science disciplines, covering physical processes through ecological impacts Drought and water scarcity 19 articles | 76,000 views Highlighting critical gaps in our understanding of water scarcity and setting urgent priorities for research and action, providing an international platform for generating an integrated perspective on this complex and socially constructed environmental hazard Overheated animals 7 articles | 29,000 views Demonstrating that climate change […]

Environment

05 May 2022

How bees prove to be skilled mathematicians and 3 other amazing science stories you may have missed

By Colm Gorey, Science Communications Manager Image: Shutterstock.com At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, many often fly under the radar. Here are just four amazing papers you may have missed. What are the odds? Honeybees join humans as the only animals known to be able to tell the difference between odd and even numbers A study published to Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution has created quite a ‘buzz’ among academics after it was found honeybees possess maths skills beyond what was originally thought. Previous studies have shown honeybees can learn to order quantities, perform simple addition and subtraction, match symbols with quantities, and relate size and number concepts. However, this time around, the bees were tasked with solving a parity experiment which involves categorizing two sets of objects as ‘odd’ and ‘even’. The bees were split into two groups: one trained to associate even numbers with sugar water and odd numbers with quinine, a bitter-tasting liquid familiar to gin drinkers. The second group was trained in the reverse with odd numbers linked to sugar water, and even numbers with quinine. Amazingly – […]

Environment

20 Apr 2022

Most read articles of March 2022: Secrets of ancient leftovers revealed and endangered shark discovered in pet food

By Colm Gorey, Science Communications Manager, Frontiers Image: Shutterstock.com Each month, Frontiers shines a spotlight on some of the leading research across a wide range of topics. Here are just some of the highlights that resonated strongly with readers on our news site in the month of March. Leftovers in prehistoric pots let scientists peek into the kitchen of an ancient civilization How do you reconstruct the cookery of people who lived thousands of years ago? Bones and plant remains can tell us what kind of ingredients were available. But to reconstruct how ingredients were combined and cooked, scientists need to study ancient cooking vessels. “Fatty molecules and microscopic remains from plants such as starch grains and phytoliths – silica structures deposited in many plant tissues – get embedded into vessels and can survive over long periods,” said Dr Akshyeta Suryanarayan, a researcher at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, Spain, and co-author on a recent study in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. In their study, Suryanarayan and co-authors analyzed such ‘leftovers’ in Copper and Bronze Age vessels – including pots, vases, goblets, jars, and platters – from today’s Gujarat, India. “Our study is the first to combine starch grain […]

Environment

28 Mar 2022

Frontiers in Environmental Chemistry 2021 Editor Awards

Frontiers in Environmental Chemistry is pleased to announce the inaugural edition of our Editor Awards. In 2021, Frontiers in Environmental Chemistry posted 28 themed article collections across our 7 specialty sections, highlighting cutting-edge themes and contemporary issues within their respective fields. We also launched various Community-Driven initiatives that were spearheaded by members of our Editorial Board. We could not have achieved these milestones without the dedication and collaboration of our Associate and Review Editors. With these awards, we aim to highlight those Associate Editors and Review Editors who we believe have gone above and beyond in the past year to make excellent contributions to our journal. All of our editorial board members have been pivotal in the continued growth and visibility of important research in the field of Frontiers in Environmental Chemistry. This success was achieved by safeguarding the quality of articles published in 2021 during the peer-review process, as well as by suggesting and leading highly relevant and contemporary article collections. We are very proud of our journal, and its community, and are grateful for each member’s support. Every member of our board helps Frontiers achieve its goal of making science open, allowing us to live healthy lives on a healthy […]

Environment

25 Mar 2022

Frontiers in Environmental Science 2021 Editor Awards

We are pleased to announce the first edition of the Frontiers in Environmental Science Editor Awards. In 2021, our journal published over two thousand articles and posted 134 Research Topics across our portfolio of 14 specialty sections. We launched the Drylands section last year, and so far we have already added two new sections in 2022 – Environmental Citizen Science and Environmental Systems Engineering. These accomplishments would not be possible without our fantastic Editors, who contributed to the growth of the journal by safeguarding the quality of the articles we have published during peer-review, as well as by suggesting and leading article collections on the themes of great significance in their respective fields. With these awards, we would like to recognise Associate Editors and Review Editors from our Editorial Board, who went above and beyond in the past year. Thanks to you, our journal can truly flourish and further realize Frontiers’ goal to make science open, so we may all live healthy lives on a healthy planet. Many congratulations to our finalists and a big thank you to all our Editors. Frontiers in Environmental Science Outstanding Associate Editors Awards Yang GaoOcean University of ChinaAtmosphere and ClimateMonika MortimerChina Jiliang UniversityBiogeochemical DynamicsAlex Oriel […]

Environment

25 Mar 2022

Last of the giant camels and archaic humans lived together in Mongolia until 27,000 years ago

By Mischa Dijkstra, Frontiers science writer Camelus knoblochi would have dwarfed the modern domestic Bactrian camel, Camelus bactrianus, which also has two humps. Image credit: Bandurka/Shutterstock.com This is the first report of fossils of a species of giant camel, Camelus knoblochi, from today’s Mongolia. The author show that the species’ last refuge in the world was in Mongolia until 27,000 years ago. There, they coexisted with archaic humans and the much smaller wild Bactrian camel C. ferus. Climate changing leading to desertification and possibly hunting by humans and competition with C. ferus drove C. knoblochi into extinction. A species of giant two-humped camel, Camelus knoblochi, is known to have lived for approximately a quarter of a million years in Central Asia. A new study in Frontiers in Earth Science shows that C. knoblochi’s last refuge was in Mongolia, until approximately 27,000 years ago. In Mongolia, the last of the species coexisted with anatomically modern humans and maybe the extinct Neanderthals or Denisovans. While the main cause of C. knoblochi’s extinction seems to have been climate change, hunting by archaic humans may also have played a role. “Here we show that the extinct camel Camelus knoblochi persisted in Mongolia until climatic […]

Environment

23 Feb 2022

Sharp drop in flower abundance caused by climate crisis will leave pollinators searching further for food

By Mischa Dijkstra, Frontiers science writer Image credit: Ellen D Moss Researchers simulated the warmer, wetter conditions predicted for northern Europe under climate change, by locally heating agricultural fields by 1.5 ºC and increasing irrigation by 40%. These conditions immediately lead to changes in the community of wildflowers and their associated insects. Most plant species were ‘losers’: they grew fewer flowers, secreted less nectar, and set fewer or lighter seeds. This reduced the food resources for pollinators, stimulating them to visit a wider range of plants. It is predicted that global average temperatures will have risen by between 0.9 and 2.0 ºC around the middle of this century, according to the IPCC’s intermediate emission scenario RCP4.5. As a result, many species, especially specialists with highly specific requirements for food, habitat, and reproduction, won’t be able to adapt. Because approximately 35% of our crops depend on insects for pollination, it is necessary to study impact of global warming on the fitness of insects and the wildflowers on which they depend for food. Once we understand the likely changes, we may be able to mitigate the negative effects for wild and crop plants. Here, a study by scientists from Newcastle University in […]

Environment

21 Feb 2022

Peace has led to more deforestation in Colombia

By K.E.D. Coan, science writer Difference between reserve and cattle ranches in Colombia. Image credit: Sebastian Di Domenico / Shutterstock In the tropics, when conflict affected countries transition to peace, deforestation often increases. But the reasons behind this trend are neither simple nor generalizable, reports a new study from Colombia. By looking at a range of agricultural and societal drivers at multiple scales, this research shows that different factors promote forest loss. Accounting for these variations will be important for developing more effective conservation strategies in the future. The consequences of peace and armed conflict for deforestation depend on the location, reports a new publication in Frontiers in Environmental Science. Using Colombia as a case study, this work presents one of the most comprehensive studies to date comparing forest loss to drivers such as coca cultivation and cattle farming during periods of peace and conflict. These insights will help make conservation efforts more effective by taking into account the land use, politics and socioeconomics on a local level. “There are other studies that show increased pressure on forests after peace agreements, but our results show that it’s very hard to generalize deforestation in the context of conflict,” said co-author Raphael […]