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Many tropical Pacific island nations are struggling to adapt to gradual sea level rise stemming from warming oceans and melting ice caps. Now they may also see much more frequent extreme interannual sea level swings. The culprit is a projected behavioral change of the El Niño phenomenon and its characteristic Pacific wind response, according to recent computer modeling experiments and tide-gauge analysis by scientists Matthew Widlansky and Axel Timmermann at the International Pacific Research Center, University of HawaiÊ»i at Mānoa, and their colleague Wenju Cai at Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in Australia.

During El Niño, warm water and high sea levels shift eastward, leaving in their wake low sea levels in the western Pacific. Scientists have already shown that this east-west seesaw is often followed six months to a year later by a similar north-south sea level seesaw with water levels dropping by up to one foot (30 cm) in the Southern Hemisphere. Such sea level drops expose shallow marine ecosystems in South Pacific Islands, causing massive coral die-offs with a foul smelling tide called taimasa (pronounced [kai’ ma’sa]) by Samoans.

An investigation has found that the majority of French lettuce contains traces of hormone disrupting chemicals, some of which are banned. Journal de l Environnement reports. 

The French NGO Générations Futures released the results of an inquiry into chemical contamination in food products on Tuesday (22 September). After examining the contaminants in strawberries in July 2013, the NGO published a report this week entitled EXPPERT 5, examining lettuce, the fourth most popular vegetable in France.

The findings were less than impressive: of the 31 products bought in supermarkets in the French departments of the Oise and the Somme, grown on conventional farms, over 77% contained traces of at least two pesticides, and only 19% were pesticide-free.

Horses need help when it comes to insect pests like flies. But, unfortunately, horse owners are in the dark about how best to manage flies because research just hasn't been done, according to a new overview of equine fly management in the latest issue of the Journal of Integrated Pest Management, an open-access journal that is written for farmers, ranchers, and extension professionals.

A recent study led by researchers at the Cornell University-affiliated Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI) in collaboration with colleagues at Rutgers and Italy’s San Raffaele University and Research Institute, shows that aspirin’s main breakdown product, salicylic acid, blocks the protein, HMGB1, which could explain many of the drug’s therapeutic properties.

The findings appear Sept. 23, 2015, in the journal Molecular Medicine.

“We’ve identified what we believe is a key target of aspirin’s active form in the body, salicylic acid, which is responsible for some of the many therapeutic effects that aspirin has,” said senior author Daniel Klessig, a professor at BTI and Cornell University. “The protein, HMGB1, is associated with many prevalent, devastating diseases, including rheumatoid arthritis, heart disease, sepsis and inflammation-associated cancers, such as colorectal cancer and mesothelioma,” he said.

Mientras que los bosques tropicales por largo tiempo han atraído la atención por su papel en la captura de carbono, los debates sobre el Ártico se han centrado en si vamos a permitir a las empresas extraer petróleo muy hacia el norte, y en qué cantidad.

Ahora, los científicos están sugiriendo que el Ártico debería atraer el interés por otra razón: El cambio climático, acelerado por el deshielo del permafrost, con la consiguiente emisión de gases de efecto invernadero, que podría costar a la economía mundial en el largo plazo, tanto como $ 43 billones de dólares.