Global

Dangerous strains of E. coli may linger longer in water

Thu, 2013-06-20 16:35 — Maeryn Obley

Submitted by Luis Kun

homelandsecuritynewswire.com - June 14th, 2013

A toxin dangerous to humans may help E. coli fend off aquatic predators, enabling strains of E. coli that produce the toxin to survive longer in lake water than benign counterparts, a new study finds.

Researchers from the University at Buffalo and Mercyhurst University reported these results online 7 June in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

“The take-home lesson is that E. coli that produce Shiga toxin persisted longer in recreational water than E. coli that don’t produce this toxin,” said UB Professor of Biological Sciences Gerald Koudelka, Ph.D., who led the study. “This is because the toxin appears to help E. coli resist predation by bacterial grazers.”

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Open Data to Fight Poverty

Tue, 2013-06-18 18:49 — Kathy Gilbeaux

openaid.de - by Claudia Schwegmann - May 7, 2013

Germany has just published its first batch of open data according to the standard of the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI). The term open data refers to quantitative and qualitative data that is machine readible and openly licenced, so that third parties are able and allowed to reuse the data. . . The following guest post by Tom Berry from aidinfo explains how open data can make a difference in fighting poverty.

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Small in Size, Big on Power: New Microbatteries a Boost for Electronics

Tue, 2013-06-18 15:21 — Kathy Gilbeaux

The graphic illustrates a high power battery technology from the University of Illinois. Ions flow between three-dimensional micro-electrodes in a lithium ion battery. Image - Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology

submitted by Albert Gomez

news.illinois.edu - by Liz Ahlberg - April 16, 2013

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Though they be but little, they are fierce. The most powerful batteries on the planet are only a few millimeters in size, yet they pack such a punch that a driver could use a cellphone powered by these batteries to jump-start a dead car battery – and then recharge the phone in the blink of an eye.

Developed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the new microbatteries out-power even the best supercapacitors and could drive new applications in radio communications and compact electronics.

Led by William P. King, the Bliss Professor of mechanical science and engineering, the researchers published their results in the April 16 issue of Nature Communications.

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Toxic waste spill in northern Alberta biggest of recent disasters in North America

Thu, 2013-06-13 17:53 — Gina Angiola

NATHAN VANDERKLIPPE

CALGARY — The Globe and Mail

PublishedWednesday, Jun. 12 2013, 2:10 PM EDT

...The spill was first spotted on June 1. But not until Wednesday did Houston-based Apache Corp. release estimates of its size, which exceeds all of the major recent spills in North America. It comes amid heightened sensitivity about pipeline safety, as the industry faces broad public opposition to plans for a series of major new oil export pipelines to the U.S., British Columbia and eastern Canada....

...“Every plant and tree died” in the area touched by the spill, said James Ahnassay, chief of the Dene Tha First Nation...

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Mass Population Response to Critical Infrastructure Failure

Wed, 2013-06-12 23:18 — Kathy Gilbeaux

submitted by Alexander Fekete

Mass Population Response to Critical Infrastructure Failure

Experts and advisory board meeting 4-5th June 2013, London

Critical infrastructures (CI) are
organizational and physical structures and
facilities of such vital importance to a
nation's society and economy that their
failure or degradation would result in
sustained supply shortages, significant
disruption of public safety and security, or
other dramatic consequences.

Source: Ministry of the Interior 2009: National CIP Strategy

Key Research Areas

1. Human and Natural Risks and Changes
2. Urban Resilience
3. Critical Infrastructure
4. Civil Security and Risk Governance
5. GIS & Remote Sensing

(SEE SLIDE PRESENTATION IN ATTACHMENT BELOW - 65 PAGE .PDF FILE)

http://www.f09.fh-koeln.de/fakultaet/personen/profs/alexander.fekete/index.html

http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alexander_Fekete/

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London Evacuation

Mon, 2013-06-10 23:40 — Kathy Gilbeaux

This report, produced for policy makers and practitioners, gives the results of a two-year project funded by the EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council) and the ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council) entitled ‘Game Theory and Adaptive Networks for Smart Evacuations’. The project brought together expertise from both the physical and social sciences to bring interdisciplinary work to bear on the issue of city evacuations in the 21st Century. In particular, issues of social media and mobile communications have revolutionised emergency management and evacuation policy and this was foremost in our minds when conducting the project.

City evacuations: preparedness, warning, action and recovery

Final report of the DFUSE project (41 page .PDF file)
(Game theory and adaptive networks for smart evacuations: EP/I005765/1)

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How Social Media Is Changing Disaster Response

Sun, 2013-06-09 23:48 — Kathy Gilbeaux

Image: Flickr/John

submitted by Robyn Wyrick

Congress is grappling with the benefits and risks of using Facebook, Twitter and other social media during emergencies

scientificamerican.com - by Dina Fine Maron - June 7, 2013

When Hurricane Katrina ravaged the U.S. Gulf Coast in 2005, Facebook was the new kid on the block. There was no Twitter for news updates, and the iPhone was not yet on the scene. By the time Hurricane Sandy slammed the eastern seaboard last year, social media had become an integral part of disaster response, filling the void in areas where cell phone service was lost while millions of Americans looked to resources including Twitter and Facebook to keep informed, locate loved ones, notify authorities and express support.

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Introducing Global Sustainability

Sun, 2013-06-09 21:38 — Kathy Gilbeaux

huffingtonpost.co.uk - by HRH The Prince of Wales - June 3, 2013

I have long been deeply concerned about the effect our modern, highly industrialised approach is having on nature's capacity to sustain life on Earth. There is a growing set of alarming problems which, if not addressed with real urgency, will severely affect nature's capacity to keep her life support systems running and thus guarantee the well-being of billions of people around the world.

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Climate research nearly unanimous on human causes, survey finds

Fri, 2013-06-07 00:38 — Maeryn Obley

'Our findings prove that there is a strong scientific agreement about the cause of climate change, despite public perceptions to the contrary'. Photograph: John McConnico/AP

Image: 'Our findings prove that there is a strong scientific agreement about the cause of climate change, despite public perceptions to the contrary'. Photograph: John McConnico/AP

guardian.co.uk - May 15th, 2013 - Suzanne Goldenberg

A survey of thousands of peer-reviewed papers in scientific journals has found 97.1% agreed that climate change is caused by human activity.

Authors of the survey, published on Thursday in the journal Environmental Research Letters, said the finding of near unanimity provided a powerful rebuttal to climate contrarians who insist the science of climate change remains unsettled.

The survey considered the work of some 29,000 scientists published in 11,994 academic papers.

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Norway, Canada, the United States and the Tar Sands

Fri, 2013-06-07 00:32 — Maeryn Obley

It is crunch time on tar sands. (photo: Greenpeace)

Image: It is crunch time on tar sands. (photo: Greenpeace)

readersupportednews.org - May 11th, 2013 - Dr. James Hansen

Today 36 Norwegian organizations sent an open letter to Prime Minister Stoltenberg expressing opposition to development of Canadian tar sands by Statoil (the Norwegian state is majority shareholder of Statoil). Signatories include not only environmental organizations, but a broad public spectrum, including, appropriately, many youth organizations. It is encouraging that Norwegian youth press their government to stop supporting tar sands development, given the fact that Norway saves much of its oil earnings for future generations and given the fact that Norway is not likely among the nations that will suffer most from climate change.

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