EARTH PORTATION curated News January 13th

AIR - High levels of molecular chlorine found in arctic atmosphere

Scientists studying the atmosphere above Barrow, Alaska, have discovered unprecedented levels of molecular chlorine in the air, a new study reports .. ...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140113095154.ht

ANIMALS - INSECTS Even among ants, size matters more than shape

Worker ants are a funny old bunch, of many shapes and sizes. But they tend to get bigger and smaller much more often than evolving entirely new shapes, according to a new study .. ...
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-ants-size.htm

ANIMALS - Freshwater turtles from wetlands can transmit Salmonella to humans

Professors have studied 200 specimens of freshwater turtles from eleven Valencian wetland areas, to determine the prevalence of Salmonella and Campylobacter in these animals, because of their potential risk of transmitting gastrointestinal diseases to humans, especially children. According to the results, 11% of the analyzed specimens of freshwater turtles were found positive for Salmonella. However, Campylobacter was not detected in any of them. ...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140113100501.ht

ANIMALS - Good vision for a good appetite

The incidence of cataracts in farmed salmon is on the rise due to vegetable-based feeds, a strong focus on fish growth and warm waters. "This is a condition we can do something about," asserts Sofie Charlotte Remø .. ...
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-good-vision-appetite.htm

ANIMALS - INSECTS How fruit flies detect sweet foods: Research opens door for investigations into taste receptors of mosquitoes

Insects represent remarkable diversity and have adapted to all sorts of ecological nooks and crannies. For example, they have taste receptors—novel proteins—with which they taste chemicals and make important choices about not only foods but also mates and where to deposit their eggs. These receptors are widely seen as being at the leading edge of behavioral adaptations .. ...
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-fruit-flies-sweet-foods-door.ht

ANIMALS - Humans Use Sound Cues to Read Dog's Emotions

Most dog owners can sense the difference between Fido's yip of joy and howl of discontent .. ...
http://news.discovery.com/animals/pets/humans-use-sound-cues

ANIMALS - Researchers capture video of freshwater fish grabbing birds out of the air

(Phys.org) —A team of researchers with North-West University in Potchefstroom, South Africa has for the first time captured on video, a freshwater fish leaping out of the water and into the air to grab a flying bird. The video was part of research the team was conducting on tigerfish in African lakes—their paper has been published in Journal of Fish Biology .. ...
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-capture-video-freshwater-fish-b

ART - Open-faced sandwiches are works of art

The sandwiches are fresh but the art is courtesy of the old masters .. ...

http://www.treehugger.com/slideshows/green-food/food-art-art

BEES - Uh oh. Britain only has 25% of the bees it needs

A honeybee deficit is threatening the viability of farming in Europe, and researchers say that relying on wild pollinators is not a solution .. ...

http://www.treehugger.com/sustainable-agriculture/europe-doe

BOOKS - 10 That Books Will Change the Way You Understand the Mind

A new wave of science fiction, from the show Person of Interestto the movie Her, features artificial intelligences whose minds are truly alien. These AIs have plural selves, or many identities running in parallel; they are basically hive minds within one consciousness. But this idea of a hive mind has a long history in scifi literature. Here are ten tales to explode your brain with minds made up of selves, rather than a single self.Read more...   ...

http://io9.com/10-that-books-will-change-the-way-you-underst

BOOKS - Book Excerpt: Everything Must Change

Brian D. McLaren with three examples of the kind of metaphors Jesus might use today if he were confronting our security, equity, and prosperity systems .. ...
http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/books/excerpts.php?id

BOOKS - Book Excerpt: Practical Theology

Terry A. Veling on how welcoming strangers enhances community .. ...
http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/books/excerpts.php?id

BOOKS - Book Review: The Call to Discernment in Troubled Times

A salute to the healing powers of humility and generosity in a world of many separations .. ...
http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/books/books.php?id=96

EARTH - Energy-Related Carbon Emissions Rose in 2013

Carbon dioxide emissions from energy activities in the U.S. are expected to be up 2 percent over 2012, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The slight increase is still just a projection as EIA awaits final year-end data, but the higher figure is attributed to an increase of coal consumption by electric utilities. Natural gas has been challenging coal’s dominance in recent years as an electric power fuel, but with higher gas ...

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/energy-related-c

ECONOMICS - Training New Lawyers to Start Affordable Law Firms

The Justice Entrepreneurs Project helps young lawyers build sustainable practices serving working-class client .. ...
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-01-13/training-new

EDUCATION - A City Education: Learning With Students by Practicing Inclusivity

Through A City Education, City Year corps members share their experiences working as tutors and mentors in schools in hopes of closing the opportunity gap and ending the dropout crisis. At City Year, our everyday work is guided by the organization's ten founding values. One of these values is inclusivity, which is defined as "an intention or policy of including people who might otherwise be excluded or marginalized." This value shines through i . ...

http://www.good.is/posts/a-city-education-learning-with-stud

EDUCATION - Men, It Is Long Past Time to Study Abroad

Despite these massive surges in the number of students studying abroad, it turns out the majority of western exchange students are women. This has left educators and study abroad students alike asking themselves, “Where are the men? .. ...
http://www.good.is/posts/men-it-is-long-past-time-to-study-a

ENERGY - Cleantech Investing: Ten Predictions for 2014

The sun is shining, the Boston snow is mostly melted away, and dilettante "news" programs have moved away from talking about cleantech to talking about doping in baseball. And my 2013 predictions weren't so bad for once (although still not great). So why not throw some 2014 predictions out there... Overall, I'm expecting the rebound in the sector to start to become more apparent. The next wave of investors and entrepreneurs should start to see
http://www.greentechmedia.com/cleantech-investing/post/clean

ENERGY - How Smart Meters Are Helping Utilities With Voltage Management

Managing voltages to save energy and reduce peak-driven strains on the grid isn’t a new idea. Some of the original volt/VAR optimization (VVO) and conservation voltage reduction (CVR) schemes are decades old. They’ve helped save lots of energy, but they’ve also faced a key limitation: the need to avoid dropping voltages so low that they start causing problems for customers at the edge of the grid. Knowing just how low voltages are getting at tho ...

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/smart-grid-snaps

ENERGY - New York Governor Announces $1 Billion Commitment To Clean Energy

Originally published on ClimateProgressby Kiley KrohImage Credit: AP Photo/Mark LennihanNew York governor Andrew Cuomo delivered his State of the State address on Wednesday and announced an even greater commitment to clean energy, including $1 billion in new funding for solar energy projects.Launched in 2012, Cuomo’s NY-Sun Initiative has already been a tremendous success, with almost 300 megawatts (MW) of solar photovoltaic capacity

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/01/13/new-york-governor-announ

ENVIRONMENT - Guest Post: The Biggest (missed) Environmental News Story of 2013

Beijing announcement illustrates the shortcomings of how we look at the future of the global transportation system By Tali Trigg
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/plugged-in/2014/01/13/gu

FASHION - Find your footing with a perfect pair of running shoes

http://www.today.com/video/today/5404669

FASHION - Use sound waves to make personalized jewelry

Go to this website, pick a material, send in an audio file. Get back jewelry in shape of the sound wave you gave them. It's simple, and oddly beautiful.Read more...    .. ...

http://io9.com/use-sound-waves-to-make-personalized-jewelry-

HOMES - This inspiring family generates only 1 quart of waste annually

Bea Johnson, author of "Zero Waste Home," uses reusable bags, glass jars, and a whole lot of ingenuity to reduce her family's footprint on the planet .. ...

http://www.treehugger.com/green-home/inspiring-family-genera

HOMES - You will want to live in The ROSE Cottage, a net zero energy home built for a lifetime

It's not rocket science, it's building science, and it's all here .. ...

http://www.treehugger.com/green-architecture/you-will-want-l

MOVIES - Get a 360-degree look at the Golden Globes fashion!

How can you really judge Sunday night's Golden Globes fashion without all the angles? (That just wouldn't be right.) TODAY partnered with Vine for a 360-degree fashion booth that provided a full close-up of all the night's best gowns and snazzy tuxes .. ...
http://www.today.com/style/get-360-degree-look-golden-globes

PEOPLE - In 'doing it all,' moms neglect an important person: themselves

Forget about having it all — many women these days are doing it all. Raising kids, working, caring for elderly parents, running a household, and often managing alone as a single mom .. ...
http://www.today.com/moms/doing-it-all-moms-neglect-importan

PEOPLE - Toxicologists offer possible explanation for cause of Alexander the Great's death

(Phys.org) —Leo Schep and fellow toxicologist Pat Wheatley are suggesting in a paper they've had published in the journal Clinical Toxicology, that Alexander the Great possibly died as a result of ingesting Veratrum album, more commonly known as white hellebore—a common plant with white flowers on it. The two researchers, both from New Zealand, suggest that other common types of poisons would have killed the famous military leader very quickly—
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-toxicologists-explanation-alexa

PERMACULTURE - Seed "Tape" Could Help Farmers in Developing Nations

A Brazilian agronomist and entrepreneur has developed a seed-planting system that promises to significantly boost the productivity of small farms. .. ...
http://www.scientificamerican.com/video.cfm?id=brazilian-inv

PERMACULTURE - Soil bacterium causes biofuel breakdown

(Phys.org) —Biofuels made from plant materials—also known as lignocellulosic biofuels—have promise as a source of sustainable alternative fuels thanks to soil bacterium known as Enterobacter lignolyticus SCF1. SCF1 degrades lignin and decomposes plant cell walls, allowing access to the cellulose sugars that plants use for energy. However, much remains to be learned about the processes and functions of SCF1 in breaking down lignin for use
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-soil-bacterium-biofuel-breakdow

PLANTS - Mushrooms and earthworms work as 'silviculture'

A model, developed by a research group of the School of Forestry at the Technical University of Madrid (UPM), has shown how some types of mushrooms (such as truffles, boletus or chanterelles) associated with earthworms can develop a mechanism of environmental engineering. The use of this model can increase the levels of calcium and salts among tree roots which can result in an increase in mycorrhizas and to enhance the development of forests.
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-mushrooms-earthworms-silvicultu

PLANTS - New discovery could stimulate plant growth and increase crop yields, researchers say

Scientists have discovered a natural mechanism in plants that could stimulate their growth even under stress and potentially lead to better crop yields .. ...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140113125146.ht

SCIENCE - On summer evenings, lakes become opportunities to spy on your friends

Ever been out on a lake and heard the whispers of someone far away on shore? A quirk of atmosphere and a quirk of physics work together to turn the body of water into a telephone.

http://io9.com/on-summer-evenings-lakes-become-opportunities

SCIENCE - Superpowerful X-Ray Laser Boils Atoms in Molecules, Nanosystems and Solids, Explodes Proteins--All in the Name of Science (preview)

An atom, molecule or speck of dust placed at the focus of the world's most powerful x-ray laser doesn't stand a chance. The illuminated matter reaches a temperature in excess of one million kelvins, as hot as the solar corona, in less than a trillionth of a second. Atoms of, for example, neon subjected to such extreme radiation rapidly lose all 10 of their electrons, and once they have lost their protective cloak of electrons, they explode away
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=superpowerf

SCIENCE - The Inner Workings of a Cybernetic Cell [Video]

A team of scientists at Stanford University has publicly released its whole-cell model of the bacterium Mycoplasma genitalium , along with full data sets from more than 3,000 simulations of the single-celled microbe growing and dividing. The video below plays back data from one of those simulations through a visualization tool called WholeCellViz, which is also available online .
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=cell-model-

SCIENCE - Weighing nanoparticles at the attogram scale

MIT engineers have devised a way to measure the mass of particles with a resolution better than an attogram—one millionth of a trillionth of a gram. Weighing these tiny particles, including both synthetic nanoparticles and biological components of cells, could help researchers better understand their composition and function .. ...
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-nanoparticles-attogram-scale.ht

SPACE - New study dramatically changes where we believe aliens might live

A team of astrobiologists has redefined conventional notions of where life can exist within a solar system. They've suggested that life could exist inside planets with inhospitable surfaces. Dubbed "subsurface habitable zones," this new definition of habitable zones means that alien life may be far more prevalent than we ever imagined.

http://io9.com/new-study-dramatically-changes-where-we-belie

SPACE - Sand Dunes Could Reveal Weather on Alien Worlds

Tracking weather conditions on other planets is no easy task, but if we start playing close attention to dune formation, we could develop a means to at least know which way the wind is blowing .. ...
http://news.discovery.com/space/sand-dunes-could-reveal-weat

SPACE - The Milky Way's black hole erupted 2 mya

http://www.good.is/posts/the-milky-way-s-black-hole-erupted-

SPACE - Tick, Tick, Tick: Hubble Spies Star Set to Self Destruct

Massive stars can be their own worst enemy, especially when they get old. Continue reading .. ...
http://news.discovery.com/space/astronomy/tick-tick-tick-hub

TREES - UK Government Planting 4 Million Trees To Help With Climate Change

Originally published on 1Sun4All.The UK Government announced an investment into their woodlands on 9, January 2014. The policy statement from the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs includes the following:England’s trees, woods and forests are an important and much-loved natural asset. They produce fuel and wood, support plant and animal life and help reduce climate change and its effects. Whether they are single street tree .. ...

http://planetsave.com/2014/01/13/uk-government-planting-4-mi

URBAN - No nano-dust danger from façade paint

After 42 months the EU research project "NanoHouse" has ended, and the verdict is a cautious "all clear" – nanoparticles in the paint used on building façades do not represent a particular health risk. Researchers discussed these results with specialists from the construction industry .. ...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140113104747.ht

URBAN - On Designboom: Chameleon Cabins made entirely of paper

This cute little Swedish friggebod changes color depending on what angle you look at it from .. ...

http://www.treehugger.com/green-architecture/designboom-cham

URBAN - Owner-occupied homes pay quantifiable benefits for neighborhoods

Homes with owner-occupiers versus renters provide annual estimated benefits to the community in excess of $1,300 per property, a research study has concluded .. ...
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-owner-occupied-homes-quantifiab

URBAN - PHOTOS: Explore 3 of Brooklyn’s Most Beautiful Townhouses

Are you looking for some inspiration to get your home looking its best in the new year? Inhabitat editor Diane Pham recently had a chance to explore three of Brooklyn’s most gorgeous townhomes, and you can take your own tour right here via her photo gallery. From beautifully-landscaped green roofs to spacious, remodeled kitchens to open-concept living rooms, the amenities in these coveted private residences are sure to spark some ideas on how to ...

http://inhabitat.com/photos-explore-3-of-brooklyns-most-beau

WATER - Washington, D.C. Water Utility Adapts to Global Warming

Upstream at the U.S. Capitol, lawmakers may dither over the right national strategies to cope with climate change and some Republicans would prefer not to believe in it at all. But downstream, the largest facility of its kind in the world is busy preparing to protect the lawmakers and the capital from a foul-smelling catastrophe that could arise if the threat of sea-level rise is ignored.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=washington-

WIND - What Can the Small Wind Industry Learn From Solar’s Success?

In 2006, the small wind industry was poised to take off in the U.S. But then solar surged ahead, leaving small wind in the dust. What happened? In this week's show, we'll look at how the small wind industry can regain its footing and live up to its potential. Small wind pioneer Andy Kruse joins us to chat about the ups and downs in the market, and to draw some parallels to distributed solar. We'll also talk about the latest developments in the
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/small-wind-the-g

WORK - Every job in America, in one graph

Whatever Friday's monthly jobs report says, it won't change the big picture. There are roughly 137 million jobs in this country. About two-thirds of those jobs are in private-sector services; the remaining third are split between goods-producing jobs (mainly manufacturing and construction) and government work (mostly at the state and local level).Here's a closer look, drawn from the same data that the government collects for the monthly jobs
http://www.good.is/posts/every-job-in-america-in-one-grap