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. Agricultural soils accumulate trace metals, particularly copper and zinc, as a result of their presence in wastes (sewage biosolids and manures) and fungicides that are applied over long periods of time. Regulations and guidelines for tolerable concentrations of these potentially plant-toxic elements in soils are based on the assumption that the toxic effects of the metals are substantially independent and not additive. However, additivity would imply that soil tolerance limits for each metal must be adjusted to compensate for the presence of another metal. There has been very little experimental work to date to provide a basis for determining the degree to which copper-zinc interaction in soils is additive as defined by the toxicity response in crops. http://www.physorg.com/news177076138.html Space & Earth Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:10:01 EST news177076138 Deep-sea ecosystems occupying 60% of the Earth's surface could be vulnerable to the effects of global warming warn scientists writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. http://www.physorg.com/news176398686.html Space & Earth Mon, 02 Nov 2009 15:38:48 EST news176398686 (PhysOrg.com) -- A new study of microscopic marine microbes, called phytoplankton, by researchers at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and the University of South Carolina has solved a ten-year-old mystery about the source of an essential nutrient in the ocean. http://www.physorg.com/news173460031.html Space & Earth Tue, 29 Sep 2009 16:30:03 EST news173460031 Emphasizing cross-disciplinary concepts in teaching soil science courses, such as mass-volume relationships, can help undergraduates learn real-world, problem-solving skills that are crucial to their success in soil science careers. http://www.physorg.com/news173359714.html Other Sciences Mon, 28 Sep 2009 12:29:16 EST news173359714 (PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers have linked poverty in sub-Saharan Africa with poor soil health, but two new Cornell studies find that the recommended practice of applying more fertilizer may not help the poorest farmers. http://www.physorg.com/news173035449.html Space & Earth Thu, 24 Sep 2009 18:36:15 EST news173035449 A dinosaur-killing asteroid may have wiped out much of life on Earth 65 million years ago, but now scientists have discovered how smaller organisms might have survived in the darkness following such a catastrophic impact. http://www.physorg.com/news171819166.html Space & Earth Thu, 10 Sep 2009 16:33:46 EST news171819166 A team of scientists has analyzed 29 esparto fields from Guadalajara to Murcia and has concluded that perennial vegetation cover is an efficient early warning system against desertification in these ecosystems. The study has been published in the Ecology magazine. http://www.physorg.com/news171275970.html Biology Fri, 04 Sep 2009 09:40:09 EST news171275970 (PhysOrg.com) -- Naturally occurring organic matter in water and sediment appears to play a key role in helping microbes convert tiny particles of mercury in the environment into a form that is dangerous to most living creatures. http://www.physorg.com/news169827722.html Space & Earth Tue, 18 Aug 2009 15:22:45 EST news169827722 Attention all smokeless tobacco users! It's time to banish the comforting notion that snuff and chewing tobacco are safe because they don't burn and produce inhalable smoke like cigarettes. A study that looked beyond the well-researched tobacco hazards, nitrosamines and nicotine, has discovered a single pinch -- the amount in a portion -- of smokeless tobacco exposes the user to the same amount of another group of dangerous chemicals as the smoke of five cigarettes. http://www.physorg.com/news169644304.html Chemistry Sun, 16 Aug 2009 12:40:01 EST news169644304 (PhysOrg.com) -- Scientists from The University of Manchester have identified preserved organic molecules in the skin of a dinosaur that died around 66-million years ago. http://www.physorg.com/news165682506.html Other Sciences Wed, 01 Jul 2009 15:55:50 EST news165682506 The Department of Energy's Joint Genome Institute (JGI) announced today that they will sequence the genomes of four species of labyrinthulomycetes. These little-known marine species were selected for sequencing as the result of a proposal submitted to the competitive JGI Community Sequencing Program by a team of microbiologists led by Dr. Jackie Collier, assistant professor at the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences (SoMAS) at Stony Brook University. http://www.physorg.com/news165498490.html Biology Mon, 29 Jun 2009 12:48:47 EST news165498490 (PhysOrg.com) -- An international oceanographic research expedition to the middle of the South Pacific Gyre - a site that is as far from continents as it is possible to go on Earth's surface - found so few organisms beneath the seafloor that it may be the least inhabited sediment ever explored for evidence of life. http://www.physorg.com/news164904604.html Space & Earth Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:50:44 EST news164904604 There is growing interest in using crop residues as the feedstock of choice for the production of cellulosic-based ethanol because of the more favorable energy output relative to grain-based ethanol. This would also help provide a solution to the debate of food versus fuel, because less of the grain would be diverted to ethanol production, leaving more available for food and feed consumption. http://www.physorg.com/news163159091.html Space & Earth Tue, 02 Jun 2009 10:58:36 EST news163159091 As the frozen soil in the Arctic thaws, bacteria will break down organic matter, releasing long-stored carbon into the warming atmosphere. http://www.physorg.com/news162649624.html Space & Earth Wed, 27 May 2009 13:27:28 EST news162649624 Driveways and parking lots may look better with a layer of sealcoat applied to the pavement, but the water running off the surface into nearby streams will be carrying more than just oxygen and hydrogen molecules. New research conducted at the University of New Hampshire Stormwater Center (UNHSC) indicates that sealcoat may contribute to increasingly significant amounts of polyaromatic hydrocarbons entering waterways from stormwater runoff. http://www.physorg.com/news158419495.html Space & Earth Wed, 08 Apr 2009 14:25:41 EST news158419495 Rising atmospheric carbon dioxide is largely responsible for recent global warming and the rise in sea levels. However, a team of scientists, including two Smithsonian ecologists, have found that this same increase in CO2 may ironically counterbalance some of its negative effects on one of the planet's most valuable ecosystems -wetlands. The team's findings are being published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the week of March 23. http://www.physorg.com/news157050125.html Space & Earth Mon, 23 Mar 2009 18:05:38 EST news157050125 The practice of no-till has increased considerably during the past 20 yr. Soils under no-till usually host a more abundant and diverse biota and are less prone to erosion, water loss, and structural breakdown than tilled soils. Their organic matter content is also often increased and consequently, no-till is proposed as a measure to mitigate the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration. However, recent studies show that the effect of no-till on carbon sequestration can be variable depending on soil and climatic conditions, and nutrient management practices. http://www.physorg.com/news154780086.html Space & Earth Wed, 25 Feb 2009 10:28:28 EST news154780086 (PhysOrg.com) -- A recent study has confirmed that although there was a large reduction of organic carbon and total nitrogen pools when prairies were first cultivated and drained, there has been no consistent pattern in these organic matter pools during the period of synthetic fertilizer use, that is, from 1957-2002. http://www.physorg.com/news151261782.html Space & Earth Thu, 15 Jan 2009 17:09:42 EST news151261782 (PhysOrg.com) -- New research shows that we should be looking to the ground, not the sky, to see where climate change could have its most perilous impact on life on Earth. http://www.physorg.com/news146746338.html Space & Earth Mon, 24 Nov 2008 10:52:18 EST news146746338 Earthworms can change the chemical nature of the carbon in North American forest litter and soils, potentially affecting the amount of carbon stored in forests, according to Purdue University researchers. http://www.physorg.com/news144333709.html Space & Earth Mon, 27 Oct 2008 13:41:49 EST news144333709 As microbes in the soil break down fallen plant matter, a diet "balanced" in nutrients appears to help control soil fertility and the normal release of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. http://www.physorg.com/news136738649.html Space & Earth Thu, 31 Jul 2008 15:57:29 EST news136738649 (PhysOrg.com) -- In the rush to develop renewable fuels from plants, converting crop residues into cellulosic ethanol would seem to be a slam dunk. http://www.physorg.com/news135332579.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Jul 2008 09:22:59 EST news135332579