http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. (PhysOrg.com) -- A whole microcosm of various bizarrely shaped life forms opens up when you look at diatoms, the primary component of ocean plankton, under a microscope. The regularly structured silica shells of these tiny individual life forms have attracted scientists because they are particularly interesting examples of natural hybrid materials and also demonstrate unusual mechanistic and optical properties. The mechanisms of the underlying biomineralization process are not yet fully understood, but the silica shells often provide inspiration for the synthesis of man-made nanostructures. http://www.physorg.com/news178901054.html Chemistry Tue, 01 Dec 2009 14:51:39 EST news178901054 (PhysOrg.com) -- Our breakfast egg is a peculiarity of nature: a single cell protected by a thin mineral layer. Apart from a number of tiny radiolaria and diatoms, individual cells normally do not have a hard shell. Korean researchers have now developed a strategy for equipping individual cells of baker`s yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, with a synthetic shell made of silicon dioxide. As the team led by Insung S. Choi reports in the journal Angewandte Chemie, the lifespan of these coated yeast cells is tripled, whilst their division is suppressed. The shell also protects the cells from unfavorable external conditions. http://www.physorg.com/news176474495.html Chemistry Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:47:08 EST news176474495 New evidence for ice-free summers with intermittent winter sea ice in the Arctic Ocean during the Late Cretaceous - a period of greenhouse conditions - gives a glimpse of how the Arctic is likely to respond to future global warming. http://www.physorg.com/news166355359.html Space & Earth Thu, 09 Jul 2009 10:49:50 EST news166355359 Scientists in Canada and India are proposing a surprising new solution to the global energy crisis -`milking` oil from the tiny, single-cell algae known as diatoms, renowned for their intricate, beautifully sculpted shells that resemble fine lacework. Their report appears online in the current issue of the ACS` bi-monthly journal Industrial Engineering & Chemical Research. http://www.physorg.com/news164635266.html Chemistry Fri, 19 Jun 2009 13:01:33 EST news164635266 Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's largest and most biologically diverse lake, faces the prospect of severe ecological disruption as a result of climate change, according to an analysis by a joint US-Russian team in the May issue of BioScience. http://www.physorg.com/news160381259.html Space & Earth Fri, 01 May 2009 07:22:15 EST news160381259 Engineers at Oregon State University have discovered a way to use an ancient life form to create one of the newest technologies for solar energy, in systems that may be surprisingly simple to build compared to existing silicon-based solar cells. http://www.physorg.com/news158418975.html Nanotechnology Wed, 08 Apr 2009 14:16:51 EST news158418975 Tiny creatures at the bottom of the food chain called diatoms suck up nearly a quarter of the atmosphere's carbon dioxide, yet research by Michigan State University scientists suggests they could become less able to "sequester" that greenhouse gas as the climate warms. The microscopic algae are a major component of plankton living in puddles, lakes and oceans. http://www.physorg.com/news156513486.html Biology Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:58:45 EST news156513486 A newly published dissertation by Linda Ampel from the Department of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology at Stockholm University in Sweden examined how rapid climate changes during the most recent ice age affected ecosystems in an area in continental Europe. http://www.physorg.com/news155830602.html Biology Mon, 09 Mar 2009 15:17:31 EST news155830602 Diatoms, mighty microscopic algae, have profound influence on climate, producing 20 percent of the oxygen we breathe by capturing atmospheric carbon and in so doing, countering the greenhouse effect. Since their evolutionary origins these photosynthetic wonders have come to acquire advantageous genes from bacterial, animal and plant ancestors enabling them to thrive in today's oceans. These findings, based on the analysis of the latest sequenced diatom genome, Phaeodactylum tricornutum, are published in 15 October edition of the journal Nature by an international team of researchers led by the U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute (DOE JGI) and the Ecole Normale Supérieure of Paris. http://www.physorg.com/news143295027.html Biology Wed, 15 Oct 2008 13:10:27 EST news143295027 It's estimated that the red tide algae, Karenia brevis, costs approximately $20 million per bloom in economic damage off the coast of Florida alone. Scientists at the Georgia Institute of Technology have found that a diatom can reduce the levels of the red tide's toxicity to animals and that the same diatom can reduce red tide's toxicity to other algae as well. If scientists can learn to use this process to reduce the toxicity of red tide, they could reduce the vast amount of economic damage done to the seafood and tourism industries. The research appears as articles in press for the Web sites of the journals Harmful Algae and the Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B. http://www.physorg.com/news138451587.html Biology Wed, 20 Aug 2008 11:46:27 EST news138451587