Gradual environmental changes due to eutrophication and global warming can cause a rapid depletion of oxygen levels in lakes and coastal waters. A new study led by professors Jef Huisman and Gerard Muyzer of the University of Amsterdam (UvA) shows that microorganisms play a key role in these disastrous regime shifts. The researchers’ findings were published in the journal Nature Communications on 6 October.

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As China struggles to find ways to remedy the noxious haze that lingers over Beijing and other cities in the winter, researchers from Georgia Institute of Technology have cast serious doubt on one proposed cause: high levels of ammonia in the air.

The wintertime air pollution has gained attention in the scientific community in recent years, prompting some scientists to propose that ammonia, emitted into the air from agricultural activities and automobiles, could be a precursor that strongly promotes the formation of the haze.

Georgia Tech researchers countered that theory in a study published September 21 in the journal Scientific Reports. The study was sponsored by the National Science Foundation.

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The cell cycle is the system through which a cell grows and divides. It is also how a cell passes its DNA to its progeny and is why the cell cycle ceases if the DNA is damaged, as otherwise it risks passing this damage to daughter cells. Scientists at the Nara Institute of Science and Technology (NAIST) have reported a new molecular mechanism that explains how this cessation occurs. The study, which can be read in Nature Communications, shows the transcription factor family MYB3R prevents progression to the division stage (M phase) of the cell cycle in Arabidopsis, a small flowering plant that is a member of the mustard family.

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