Gleanings of the Week Ending July 19, 2014
/The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.
Two articles related to elephants caught my eye this past week: Does this trunk make me look fat? about overweight zoo elephants and Short lives, violent deaths about the findings from the CT scans of the remains of 2 Siberian mammoth calves (one was 30-35 days old and the other was 52-57 days old).
Icelanders Grieve for the Peculiar Lake Balls - Lake Myvatn used to have balls of algae all over its bottom. Now the lake is full of algae-smothering sediment after mining operations dumped extra phosphorous and nitrogen into the lake cause dense bacteria blooms. There are a few other places in the world where the balls of algae form but one is gone.
NIH Senior Health - NIH has a web site specifically for health and wellness information for older adults!
Longhorns on the Prairie - Not cattle….beetles!
Journey Underground to These Eye-Poppingly Incredible Old Mines - The images look like science fiction (dystopian). Many appear to be open for tourists.
Exploring the Parks: New River Gorge National River - Looks like a beautiful place in West Virginia. I’m putting the link on my ‘vacation planning list!
One injection stops diabetes in its tracks: Treatment reverses symptoms of type 2 diabetes in mice without side effects - Lots of research to come on this. Too good to be true for humans?
14 Fun Facts about Piranhas - From Smithsonian.com. Somehow these fish rank right up there with sharks as ‘scary things in the water.’
Contributing factors to groundwater table declines identified - The article includes color coded maps of Texas from the 1930s to 2000s and shows how much deeper one has to look these days to find groundwater in the state. The declines are mostly due to irrigation and population growth….but there are other factors too. The population of the state is expected to double by 2060 while the water supply is expected to decline by 10%. Something has to change (probably more than a single thing)!
The Soil Pollution Crisis in China: A Cleanup Presents Daunting Challenge - Third and final of a series. The links for the other two articles in the series are at the bottom of this final article. Scary stuff. With population growth, it is tragic to damage farmland.
