ScienceDaily: Top Environment News

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• How bumblebees find efficient routes without a GPS: Bees use trial and error to select optimal route
• New uses for old tools could boost biodiesel output
• The original 'Twitter'? Tiny electronic tags monitor birds' social networks
• Many proteins exist in a state of 'disorder' and yet are functional
• How the sub-Saharan cheetah got its stripes: Californian feral cats help unlock biological secret
• Pesticides not yet proven guilty of causing honeybee declines, experts say
• Unusual symbiosis in marine microorganisms fertilizes ocean by fixing nitrogen
• Khoe-San peoples diverged before 'out-of-Africa' migration of modern humans
• Scientists uncover mechanism by which plants inherit epigenetic modifications
• Study shows ancient relations between language families
• Genome-invading retroviruses have a nasty surprise for koalas: Serious pathological impact for centuries
• DNA analysis aids in classifying single-celled algae
• Adolescent male chimps in large community strive to be alphas
• Humans were already recycling 13,000 years ago, burnt artifacts show
• Invisible plastic particles in seawater damaging to sea animals
• First giant salamander was a hot hunter
• Invasive 'Rasberry Crazy Ant' in Texas now identified species
• Osteoporosis in the world's oceans: Bioeroding sponges are threatening coral reefs

How bumblebees find efficient routes without a GPS: Bees use trial and error to select optimal route Posted: 20 Sep 2012 04:46 PM PDT Scientists have tracked bumblebees for the first time to see how they select the optimal route to collect nectar from multiple flowers and return to their nest.

New uses for old tools could boost biodiesel output Posted: 20 Sep 2012 01:46 PM PDT Tried-and-true techniques could help optimize oilseed yield for biodiesel production, according to recent studies.

The original 'Twitter'? Tiny electronic tags monitor birds' social networks Posted: 20 Sep 2012 12:31 PM PDT A tiny, digital tag provides a first peek at the social lives of small animals. Using the tags to track New Caledonian crows revealed a surprising amount of interaction among the tool-using birds.

Many proteins exist in a state of 'disorder' and yet are functional Posted: 20 Sep 2012 11:11 AM PDT For 100 years, the dogma has been that amino acid sequence determines protein folding and that the folded structure determines function. But researchers explain in a new study, a large class of proteins doesn't adhere to the structure-function paradigm. Called intrinsically disordered proteins, these proteins fail fold either in whole or in part and yet they are functional.

How the sub-Saharan cheetah got its stripes: Californian feral cats help unlock biological secret Posted: 20 Sep 2012 11:11 AM PDT Feral cats in Northern California have enabled researchers to unlock the biological secret behind a rare, striped cheetah found only in sub-Saharan Africa, according to researchers. The study is the first to identify a molecular basis of coat patterning in mammals.

Pesticides not yet proven guilty of causing honeybee declines, experts say Posted: 20 Sep 2012 11:11 AM PDT The impact of crop pesticides on honeybee colonies is unlikely to cause colony collapse, according to a new article. More research is now needed to predict the impact of widely-used agricultural insecticides, called neonicotinoids, on honeybee populations. Scientists have pointed out flaws in previous research that predicted that neonicotinoids could cause honeybee colony collapse. Neonicotinoids are among the most widely-used agricultural insecticides and honeybees ingest residues of the pesticides as they gather nectar and pollen from treated plants.

Unusual symbiosis in marine microorganisms fertilizes ocean by fixing nitrogen Posted: 20 Sep 2012 11:11 AM PDT Scientists have discovered an unusual symbiosis between tiny single-celled algae and highly specialized bacteria. Their partnership plays an important role in marine ecosystems, fertilizing the oceans by taking nitrogen from the atmosphere and "fixing" it into a form that other organisms can use.

Khoe-San peoples diverged before 'out-of-Africa' migration of modern humans Posted: 20 Sep 2012 11:11 AM PDT The largest genomic study ever conducted among Khoe and San groups reveals that these groups from southern Africa are descendants of the earliest diversification event in the history of all humans -- some 100,000 years ago, well before the 'out-of-Africa' migration of modern humans.

Scientists uncover mechanism by which plants inherit epigenetic modifications Posted: 20 Sep 2012 11:01 AM PDT Scientists have discovered that epigenetic modifications can be inherited in pollen and that this process is guided by small RNA. By this mechanism, acquired traits can be inherited over many hundreds of generations. This discovery will influence the ways people think about cross-breeding to select for desirable traits in crops such as those that have important agricultural and economic implications.

Study shows ancient relations between language families Posted: 20 Sep 2012 10:53 AM PDT How do language families evolve over many thousands of years? How stable over time are structural features of languages? Researchers introduced a new method using Bayesian phylogenetic approaches to analyse the evolution of structural features in more than 50 language families.

Genome-invading retroviruses have a nasty surprise for koalas: Serious pathological impact for centuries Posted: 20 Sep 2012 10:53 AM PDT By integrating themselves into the germ line of their host, retroviruses change the genetic code of their host. The only known case where this process can be currently observed is in Koalas. As scientists just found out, this process may take longer than expected, with the virus continuing to have a serious pathological impact on the host which may go on for centuries.

DNA analysis aids in classifying single-celled algae Posted: 20 Sep 2012 09:05 AM PDT For nearly 260 years -- since Carl Linnaeus developed his system of naming plants and animals -- researchers classified species based on visual attributes like color, shape and size. In the past few decades, researchers found that sequencing DNA can more accurately identify species. A group of single-celled algae -- Symbiodinum -- that live inside corals and are critical to their survival -- are only now being separated into species using DNA analysis, according to biologists.

Adolescent male chimps in large community strive to be alphas Posted: 20 Sep 2012 06:53 AM PDT An anthropologist reports the first observation of dominance relationships among adolescent male chimpanzees, which he attributes to the composition of their community.

Humans were already recycling 13,000 years ago, burnt artifacts show Posted: 20 Sep 2012 05:25 AM PDT A new study reveals that humans from the Upper Palaeolithic Age recycled their stone artefacts to be put to other uses. The study is based on burnt artifacts found in Tarragona, Spain.

Invisible plastic particles in seawater damaging to sea animals Posted: 20 Sep 2012 05:25 AM PDT The presence of 'plastic soup' in the oceans is regarded as a big problem. Tiny plastic particles enter the sea when plastic debris decomposes. Such particles are probably also released from cosmetics and from clothes in the wash, subsequently entering the sewage system and surface waters and eventually reaching the sea.

First giant salamander was a hot hunter Posted: 20 Sep 2012 05:25 AM PDT Modern giant salamanders live only in water – but their ancestors ventured out on land, say geoscientists at the University of Tübingen.

Invasive 'Rasberry Crazy Ant' in Texas now identified species Posted: 19 Sep 2012 04:09 PM PDT The Rasberry Crazy Ant is an invasive ant that was first noticed infesting areas around Houston, Texas ten years ago, but its species identity has remained undetermined until now.

Osteoporosis in the world's oceans: Bioeroding sponges are threatening coral reefs Posted: 19 Sep 2012 05:29 AM PDT Due to the massive production of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, our oceans are becoming increasingly acidic. Scientists studied the consequences of ocean acidification on sponges that bore into calcareous materials such as coral skeletons. Results show that these sponges will profit from global changes, while coral reefs are threatened in their survival.

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