Gleanings of the Week Ending November 5, 2016

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.

Oldest known planet-forming disk discovered – Citizen scientist played a role in this discovery. Hurray for NASA’s Disk Detective project!

Daddy Longlegs Won’t Kill You – Having just finished the fall season of outdoor field trips…I enjoyed this article about daddy longlegs/harvestmen which is a frequent find. I’ve picked up some trivia to share next year about them.

Hard of hearing? It’s not your ears, it’s your brain – Evidently, many older people find understanding speech difficult even when their hearing (the ear part) is fine.

Risks of Managing Prairies Exclusively for Plants – Plants are a part of the environment that are sometimes the easiest to see and ‘manage’ ---- but that might not result in a health system. It’s a more complex situation and we often don’t have the depth of understanding to build a sustainable environment that is comparable to the ‘natural’ one that once was there.

Futures Ghosts? Wildlife on the Brink of Extinction – Have you heard of these animals before…and realize they are near extinction? The rusty patched bumble bee has just recently been ‘in the news.’

World’s largest study shows effects of long-term exposure to air pollution and traffic noise on blood pressure and $37 Billion = Health & Climate Costs from Gas Cars in 10 States Every Year – Two articles about impact on health caused by human-caused degradation of our environment.

The Chemistry of Mummification – A post prompted by Halloween. I was a little late in reading it.

Blue Leaf Special – Chloroplasts may be more than just photochemical…they may also be involved in light propagation and light capture….and the interplay between the three functions.

Extreme cold winters fueled by jet stream and climate change – Improving the long-term forecast of winter weather in the UK and US.

So you want to talk to a journalist? – A tutorial for science types – before they talk to journalists!

Gleanings of the Week Ending August 27, 2016

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.

Dome of Thomas Jefferson Memorial Not As Gleaming As It Once Was – Biofilm is making the dome darken…and it is hard to treat without damaging the marble of the monument.

The Giant Pyramid Hidden Inside a Mountain – It’s in Cholula (Mexico) and the largest pyramid on the planet (base is 4x larger that the Great Pyramid at Giza and nearly twice the volume).

Longest-lived vertebrate is Greenland Shark: Lifespan at least 400 years – The specimens studied were caught as by-catch. I wondered how big the population is and if the by-catch is actually having an impact on the species; no info on that from the article.

365 pounds of Anacostia Park Goose Breast Going to Afterschool Lunch Program – I wonder if geese from nearby areas has filled in the void at Anacostia Park. Our area has a lot of resident Canadian Geese.

SpaceDrafts Vids! – My daughter is part of the group that finds speakers for the Space Drafts monthly events in Tucson…and they’ve made videos of the latest talks available. Most of the speakers are from University of Arizona, Lunar and Planetary Lab.

Invasive Species Spotlight: Devil’s Tail – Another name for mile-a-minute…a very common invasive plant in Maryland. This blog post gives some history of the plant.

How it feels to live in darkness – Dialog in the Dark exhibit in the Children’s Museum in Holon, Israel gives sighted people a 90-minute tour of what it is like to be a blind person.

Let there be LED: The future of light-based technologies for interiors – Anything that gets closer to natural light (for during the day) and can be tuned to not inhibit melatonin production at night would be what the kind of lighting I would want in my house.

Transparent wood windows are cooler than glass: Study –  I would like to have skylights made of this kind of material.

The Killer Flood Made of Molasses – In 1919, a tank holding 2.3 million gallons of molasses collapsed created a 20-feet-high wave of molasses. It flattened buildings and picked up people. 21 people died, 150 were injured.

Gleanings of the Week Ending August 6, 2016

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.

Kathleen Clemons Instagram – Instructor for some of my favorite Creative Live classes….sharing photos taken with her iPhone. Beautiful images…mostly flowers.

Milkweed Meadow posts from What’s That Bug? – A cluster of milkweed plants is a great place to look if you want to find insects. This series of blog posts is focused on typical insects you’ll find.

How to Prevent Mosquito Bites – I am paying more attention to articles like this since Florida is reporting more Zika cases…and I’m planning a trip to Florida this fall.

Did We Used to Have Two Sleeps Rather Than One? Should We Again? – Maybe we were not meant to sleep all the way through the night!

The New Green Grid: Utilities Deploy ‘Virtual Power Plants’ – Sprawling networks of independent batteries, solar panels, and energy efficient buildings tied together and remotely controlled by software and data systems….a trend boosted by California’s natural gas shortfall that will become the norm?

Third Severe Flash Flood Hits Maryland/Delaware – The Ellicott City flash flood on the evening of 7/30 (just a week ago) was close to home…lots of destruction of the history main street.

Mystery Mechanisms – Many drugs appear to work…but we don’t know exactly how they work. This post discusses lithium, acetaminophen, and modafinil.

Why do we get bags under our eyes? – No stunning revelations in this article – but interesting that there are multiple reasons that people get them.

Awesome Video Compares the Size of Different Plants and Stars in the Universe – The video is a sequel to Star Size (and distances) which is also included in the post.

Earth’s ‘Annual Physical’ Lists Symptoms of a Hotter World – State of the Climate in 2015 from NOAA (and internationally peer reviewed). The indicators of a warming planet that are: greenhouse gases highest on record, global surface temperature highest on record, sea surface temperatures highest on record, global upper ocean heat content highest on record, global sea level highest on record, extremes were observed in the water cycle and precipitation. The post includes links to download the report – chapter by chapter.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 30, 2016

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.

What will power tomorrow’s spacecraft? – Lots of options – some ready now and others being developed.

Stock Your Pantry with Plant-Based Protein – I’m not as keen on soy products (except for the nuts themselves) but I have most of the rest in my pantry already; they store well and can be easily be used for quick meals.

Tea or coffee: Which drink is better for you? – Does it matter? This analysis says it is a draw. Tea does not interfere as much as coffee with sleep but is does stain tea more.

New Bioplastic Mashup Spells Doom for Petrochemical Industry – DuPont and Archer Daniel Midland join the flurry of activity in the bioplastic arena….and they may be big enough to overcome the entrenched political interests supported by the petroleum industry. It is good to understand that as we move to a more sustainable tech….plastics will still be around.

A natural beauty: American geoheritage – Geoparks (a UNESCO designation) are becoming popular around the world but not in the US because of political differences within our country. There are over 100 areas in 34 countries that are designated as Geoparks at this point. Over the next year, we’ll be hearing more about them culminating in the 2016 Earth Science Week (Oct. 9-15). A list of countries and sites is available here.

So You Want to Eat Snow. Is It Safe? We Asked Scientists – I do enjoy snow ice cream….but I wait until it has snowed for a while before I collect the snow.

20 Indoor Air Pollution Tips – I heard most of these before….but it is good to see them collected into a single list. I’m glad they included scented products and sprays on the list.

Women Asked to Avoid Pregnancy as Zika Epidemic Worsens – A story to follow since the mosquitos that carry the virus are relatively widespread….it is just that they are not infected with the Zika virus yet in the US. Asking a population to avoid pregnancy is not a solution…but 3,500 (and probably growing) cases of microcephaly will impact lives and economies for years to come.

8 Great Benefits of Walking – A good list with links to the research that backs up the claims.

Best Things about Electric Cars – Results of a survey of electric car owners.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 2, 2016

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.

12 Machines that show modern farming isn’t the bucolic life you imagine – Wow! The way our food is harvested is mechanically amazing but also seems violent. I wondered if it was dangerous for the workers that tend the machines.

How do you prepare for the isolation of space? – Using Antarctica as a training location for space missions.

What’s the difference between reindeer and caribou – It’s past Christmas – but I didn’t see this article in time. Evidently they are the same species! But reindeer show the impact of domestication.

New kind of thermal vent system found in Caribbean – They are formed of talc rather than sulphide minerals.

How Juneau handles its garbage – They ship their recyclables south via barge and try to minimize the garbage that they landfill nearby (although space is limited). Other municipalities may not face quite the transportation challenge that Juneau faces (no overland transportation from the city) but the long term issues toward sustainability are the same.

Photography in the National Parks: Your Armchair Guide to Mesa Verde National Park – It’s been over 30 years since I was Mesa Verde; these pictures encourage me to plan another visit.

Is This Snowy Wonderland Or The World Inside A Petri Dish? – Cut paper versions of bacteria and other organisms

Our Energy Transformation in 2015 – Even with low oil and gas prices, we are still shifting way from fossil fuels. Oil consumption in the US is on a downward trend and the adoption of clean energy hit record rates in 2015. For the first time in history, carbon emissions fell even as the world economy grew.

US Wild Bee Populations Waning – Not good. Most of our agriculture needs pollinators and yet these are the very areas where the wild bees are being decimated.

New Species Abound – And these are new species that are large enough to be visible. What about all the soil microbes that we know so little about? It’s time we internalize that we really don’t know all the species on our planet.