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Un nuevo estudio de la Universidad de Washington que puso a prueba 65 vinos de los cuatro principales estados productores de vino de Estados Unidos, California, Washington, Nueva York y Oregon, ha encontrado que todos los vinos, excepto uno de ellos, tienen niveles de arsénico que superan lo permitido en el agua potable.

La Agencia de Protección Ambiental de Estados Unidos permite que el agua potable contenga no más de 10 partes por mil millones de arsénico. Las muestras de vino variaron de 10 a 76 partes por mil millones, con un promedio de 24 partes por mil millones.

Higher temperatures result in Swedish sand lizards laying their eggs earlier, which leads to better fitness and survival in their offspring, according to research published in the open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology.

The findings indicate that climate change could have positive effects on this population of high-latitude lizard, but the authors warn that climate change is likely to affect a whole suite of traits, in addition to egg-laying date, which together would have an unknown combined effect on survival and reproductive success.

Thirty-one percent of cactus species are threatened with extinction, according to the first comprehensive, global assessment of the species group by IUCN and partners, published today in the journal Nature Plants. 

This places cacti among the most threatened taxonomic groups assessed on The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species™ - more threatened than mammals and birds.

Making predictions about climate variability often means looking to the past to find trends. Now paleoclimate researchers from the University of Missouri have found clues in exposed bedrock alongside an Alabama highway that could help forecast climate variability. In their study, the researchers verified evidence suggesting carbon dioxide decreased significantly at the end of the Ordovician Period, 450 million years ago, preceding an ice age and eventual mass extinction. These results will help climatologists better predict future environmental changes.

The Ordovician geologic period included a climate characterized by high atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels, warm average temperatures and flourishing life. Near the end of the period, CO2 levels dropped significantly but precisely when and how fast is poorly known. Kenneth MacLeod, a professor in the Department of Geological Sciences in the MU College of Arts and Science, directed a research team studying the climate changes 450 million years ago to better understand the interactions among the biosphere, the oceans, atmospheric CO2 levels, and temperature.

Ever since human beings first began climbing the world's tallest mountains, they have struggled with a basic problem: altitude sickness, caused by lower air pressures which affect the ability of our bodies to take up oxygen. 

Or, as actor Jason Clarke says in his role as the climbing guide Rob Hall in the recently released movie, Everest, "Human beings simply aren't built to function at the cruising altitude of a 747."