Ecology and the Environment

Hi, I've been considering starting a degree in environmental sciences and live in the South West. Can anyone recommend any good courses or Unis?

or rather most of it: I thought they eat insects...

Greetings everyone, I am new here. I registered because I am hoping someone can help me identify a phenomenon involving drosophila flies in my kitchen. Today, I looked at the window glass and saw this: Who can identify this white spray around the dead fruit flies? I've seen this before a few times, but I couldn't find any information on it (though maybe I just used the wrong search terms). Is it some kind of fungus? Best regards, andron

This forum is to share with you my ongoing experiment where I see how woodlouse act to a certain amount of weed killer this is to try and better understand the effects of weedkiller on insects. I will post daily updates so if you have any suggestions or questions regarding this please feel free to say

I never knew any of this. This looks horrible and strikes me as the sort of unnecessary exploitation that can lead to a population collapse. Is anyone familiar with this, and could say more about it? Biomedical labs bleed horseshoe crabs for vaccines with little accountability : NPR

My former professor asks to forward this announcement to anyone interested. So, here it goes: Subject: SC-012-2023 This is a re-announcement. Primary duties are beaver trapping. Noel E. Myers Noel E. Myers State Director – South Carolina USDA APHIS WS 400 Northeast Drive, Suite L Columbia, SC 29203 (803) 477-3151 (o) (803) 786-9472 (f) SC-012-2023_reannouncement.pdf

Propose an experiment involving Pill bugs (Isopods) with 1 control and 3 levels of Independent variable. The control and each Independent variable level should have a minimum of 5 trials each. The project should consist of 4 parts. I'm looking for something unique and not the typical soil moisture experiment. This is for a high school project so it should be do-able but should still impress the judges and get a good score.

Choosing the right grease trap treatment for your business guys? With so many different options available, it can be difficult to know which treatment will be most effective for your specific needs.

Analyse the strategies of exploitation of the host and ways of avoiding the immune response by parasites and suggest, in your opinion, the best parasite among the existing ones and ways of fighting against such "elusive Avenger"?

what are the applications of studying the nanoparticles effects on plant? could be studied on medicinal plant or only crops ? for studying plant respiration what are the methods?

"Freshwater mussels are one of the most endangered groups of animals on the planet, with 47% either extinct or threatened with extinction. Yet we hear almost nothing about the extinction crisis they face." "In 2019, the death of hundreds of thousands of pheasantshell mussels in the Clinch River in Tennessee, U.S. may have been caused by a virus, and prolonged droughts have killed mussels en masse throughout the U.S. and Australia." https://phys.org/news/2022-01-century-rivers-freshwater-mussels-dying.html The foundations for our food webs (and life as we know it) are usually small and overlooked organisms, but we need them.

what shall I do for that? growing the plant from seeds or apply the stress on young plant or from stem cutting??

Until reading of Australia's first kangaroo attack death since 1936, on Monday, I hadn't realized that male roos perceive our bipedalism as a challenge posture. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-62884861 I hope all our Australian members are well - @beecee , who has been quiet lately, and IIRC is the same age as the victim...well, if he wanted to give a shout? I realize I have possibly not created much fodder for discussion, beyond the obvious assertions that wild animals do not make good pets. But perhaps there are exceptions.

Hello dears, I'd like to understand what is meant by Oxygen has been quenched in the following context and the overall meaning of the context: The nature of the first cells is a subject of enthusiastic conjecture in the absence of objective data beyond the evident presence of life today. The relative timing of the origin of archaea and bacteria is unknown, but fossils show that filamentous prokaryotes resembling today’s cyanobacteria had evolved at least 3.5 billion years ago. It is possible that these microbes performed oxygenic photosynthesis, but measurements of radioactive isotopes show that the sharp rise in atmospheric oxygen known as the Great…

Hello, I'd like to know what is meant by viral turnover in the following context: Rough estimates suggest that the lysis of cells by marine viruses removes 20 to 40 per cent of all of the bacteria every day. This astonishing viral turnover of planktonic microbes fertilizes the water below the sunlit surface of the sea.

Hello, Does any body know what is what are mushroom-growing termites. does it refer to kinde of termites that help in growing mushrooms and fungi as set in one of the websites (Fungus-farming termites (Odontotermes obesus) are able to sniff out weedy, parasitic fungi (Pseudoxylaria) and selectively bury them alive because they smell different than the crops. Fungus-farming termites grow a fungus, Termitomyces, in carbon-dioxide rich environments of their nest mounds.)? Here is the context: A different nutritional strategy has evolved among a group of mushroom-growing termites in Africa and elsewhere in the Old World that use fungi rather than gu…

I operate as a rule of thumb that the time of high tide advances by about an hour from one day to the next. Not exactly of course -a bit under the hour I think . I don't understand ,though why these time differences are irregular. One day it might be around and hour and the next day it could be about 45 minutes. What causes this irregular pattern? Are the tides are part of a chaotic global maritime weather system?

Hi, I want to identify the benthic diatoms present in my sediment cores. To do this, I will need to collect and fix the diatoms in order to transport the samples back to my lab for identification as I am carry out field work overseas. Could anyone help to advise me how to: 1. Collect the benthic diatoms for the sediment surface of my cores? 2. How to fix the diatoms - probably using Lugols? 3. How to extract the diatoms from the sediment, should I do this before or after fixing in Lugols? 4. I will need to use a light micrscope to identify the diatoms. How should I go about doing this? Thanks

Hi, I am trying to find a protocol for a modified Berthelot ammonia assay using salicylate and a catalyst. I am struggling to find a protocol that describes the individual reagent recipes and the precise protocol to follow for the assay such as; How much of each reagent to add, when to add each reagent, how to long to leave the sample to process in each step? I am hoping to use a method that does now require a water bath and allows the reaction to occur at room temperature with the use of a catalsyt. I will also be using it on seawater samples so I will need to add some component to help avoid interference for metals or precipitate formation. C…

Hi, I am running an experiment and I want to measure the water content and organic matter content of my sediment cores. I am currently working as a research visitor and the lab I am at does not have access to an oven or muffle furnace. The manager has suggested I freeze dry the samples to measure water content. Could I then transport the freeze dried sediment samples back to my home land and measure the organic matter content through Loss-on-ignition? Or will the freeze dryer process interfere with the organic matter content? Thanks

Hello! I create this Topic in first for to learn and understand artificial photosynthesis ! In view of recent climate change this seems important to me. If anyone can share info to quickly and easily uderstand how it works. Or just discuss with other people much more competent than me. You're welcome I guess

Hi All, My motorcycle meter has developed a fog inside the glass. Neither oven to 60 °C of vacuum evaporated the fog. I took a closer look and conclude to a fungus. Seen from under, identification may be tricky! I can inject a liquid inside and not soak the dial or touch the mechanism. Tried 100% isopropanol. I can put the front glass in an ultrasonic water bath, what solution inside? Peroxyde and alcool rinse or pool chlorine+water or javel ? Finally water+dishwasher rinse? A Greek Windex soak?

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/29/nurdles-plastic-pellets-environmental-ocean-spills-toxic-waste-not-classified-hazardous Is it time to further consider using containers made from biodegradable materials?

https://phys.org/news/2022-04-antarctic-sea-ice-expansion-climate.html Antarctic sea-ice has expanded over the period of continuous satellite monitoring, which seemingly contradicts ongoing global warming resulting from increasing concentrations of greenhouse gasses. In a study, published in Nature Climate Change, an international team of scientists from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and South Korea shows that a multi-decadal swing of the tropical sea surface temperatures and its ability to change the atmospheric circulation across large distances is in large part responsible for the observed sea-ice expans…

https://phys.org/news/2022-04-choices-world-global-degrees-celsius.html When the 2015 Paris Agreement set a long-term goal of keeping global warming "well below 2 degrees Celsius, compared to pre-industrial levels" to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, it did not specify how its nearly 200 signatory nations could collectively achieve that goal. Each nation was left to its own devices to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in alignment with the 2 C target. Now a new modeling strategy developed at the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change that explores hundreds of potential future development pathways provides new insights on the energy and t…