



Dvanaest dobrih razloga da podržite Zakladu za zaštitu životinja Bestie iz Splita.
POMOZITE ZAKLADI BESTIE: MOLIM VAS DONIRAJTE!
Detalji za donacije:
Jednog lijepog sunčanog dana u ožujku, jedno sretno štene došetalo je u Jelsu popiti kavu sa svojim novim vlasnicima.




Dvanaest dobrih razloga da podržite Zakladu za zaštitu životinja Bestie iz Splita.
POMOZITE ZAKLADI BESTIE: MOLIM VAS DONIRAJTE!
Detalji za donacije:
Move to dismantle $368m sea observatory initiative faced opposition from experts and lawmakers
The Donald Trump administration has reversed its decision to dismantle a $368m deep-sea observation system following an outcry from lawmakers and ocean experts.
On Thursday, the National Science Foundation announced that it would halt plans to dismantle the Ocean Observatories Initiative, stating: “effective immediately, [it] will not proceed with further removal or descoping of equipment from the remaining arrays and will continue operations including planned maintenance”.
Continue reading...
Expansion could also hit access to housing, education, healthcare, open spaces and transport, analysis says
Construction of a third runway at Heathrow is likely to have significant adverse effects on the health and wellbeing of up to 3 million people living nearby, an official report has said, as the government launched the next stage of its rapid airport expansion plan.
An analysis for the Department for Transport (DfT) has found that expanding London’s hub airport could have “major adverse” impacts on the health of the most local population.
Continue reading...
In this week’s newsletter: The melting of the Arctic’s summer sea ice is the most visible upshot of the climate crisis. Refreezing it might be a long shot – but do drastic times call for drastic measures?
• Don’t get Down to Earth delivered to your inbox? Sign up here
Speeding across rapidly melting Arctic ice on a snowmobile gave me a vivid feel for its beauty and fragility. The brilliant white landscape gleamed ahead, while the sky blue pools of meltwater jetted up on to my boots.
When I visited Cambridge Bay in northern Canada at the start of this month, the melt season had hit with brutal speed: temperatures were 5-10C above normal, kickstarting the melting almost overnight.
Why farmers see Colombia’s knife-edge election as a battle for the Amazon’s future
Jamaica’s beach access crisis: ‘We shouldn’t be forced to fight for what is already ours’
‘The Antarctic is the last frontier’: the quest to save Shackleton’s Endurance
Continue reading...
Scientists are examining how ‘blood rain’ affects soil microbiome, with Portuguese vineyards a particular focus
Dust events, when thousands of tonnes of fine sand whipped up from the Sahara are dumped over Europe, are becoming more intense. These sometimes produce “blood rain” that leaves visible red streaks, and while generally harmless, the dust is not sterile but brings a freight of microorganisms.
One big concern is how imported microbes may affect the soil microbiome and impact agricultural fertility and crop yield. Southern Portugal lies along one of the main deposition routes for Saharan dust, and the effect on vineyards in particular is a growing concern. A team from the University of Lisbon carried out genomic mapping of microbes in dust samples from 2022’s Storm Celia.
Continue reading...
The warming caused by climate breakdown in the landlocked east Asian country is transforming its fragile ecosystem
As the climate crisis accelerates, Mongolia is warming rapidly, transforming the country’s cryosphere, including some of the most southerly permafrost landscapes in the northern hemisphere.
Although rarely associated with the Arctic, Mongolia has a remarkably cold climate. Ulaanbaatar is the coldest capital city in the world, and a substantial portion of the country lies within the Arctic Ocean drainage basin. As a result, many of the physical and ecological processes occurring here resemble those found at much higher latitudes.
People in Khövsgöl province say they have observed an increase in the number of arrivals of migratory birds from China in recent years, consuming large quantities of fish in the region’s lakes. In northern Mongolia, communities closely tied to fishing, herding and tourism are witnessing the visible transformation of fragile freshwater ecosystems shaped by climate breakdown and the changing cryosphere.
Historical surveys conducted in the 1970s suggested that nearly 63% of Mongolia was underlain by permafrost. Today, estimates indicate that only 26% to 29% remains. Unlike the ice-rich permafrost of Siberia, Canada or Alaska, much of Mongolia’s permafrost is relatively warm, thin and dry, making it particularly sensitive to rising temperatures. Climate change is the primary reason for this decline, although local pressures such as overgrazing can further accelerate thaw by removing the vegetation that insulates the ground – Nikolay Shiklomanov, a professor in the department of geography and environment at George Washington University
Continue reading...
Veteran campaigner Robin Hanbury-Tenison is raising money for a research station near his home in Cornwall
Pedalling on water for more than a hundred miles in a heatwave, pushed back by east winds and having to navigate 31 locks would be a challenge for anybody. But when that body is 90 years old, with a bad knee, failing balance and malfunctioning arms and shoulders, it’s a herculean feat.
Rainforest campaigner Robin Hanbury-Tenison, 90, is pedalling 104 miles down the River Thames from Oxford to Richmond on a water-bike to raise money for a unique research station which is being built to study Britain’s temperate rainforest.
Continue reading...
Portsmouth, Hampshire: A huge conservation effort is under way to restore native oysters to the Solent, and I was on hand to help give them a pre-release spa day
Native oysters (Ostrea edulis) have been harvested from Chichester Harbour since Roman times, but due to overfishing, disease, pollution and competition from invasive Pacific oysters (Magallana gigas), the population has declined by 96% over the past century.
The Solent Oyster Restoration Project is working to restore reefs by reseeding them with juveniles and installing cages containing a high density of mature broodstock beneath pontoons, to facilitate the release of millions of larvae.
Continue reading...
As demand soars, the country’s mangrove forests and the livelihoods of shellfish gatherers are under threat from encroaching farms and unchecked pollution
At low tide, Johana Carolina Cruz Potes steps into the mudflats around Isla Costa Rica, in Ecuador’s Jambelí Archipelago. Holding a bucket and a short metal hook, she probes the tangled roots of a mangrove patch, searching for conchanegra, black-shelled cockles, buried beneath the sludge.
Cruz Potes has done this work since she was nine, when she first followed her father into the mud. But earning a living from shellfish gathering – often the only income for families here – has become harder as grounds shrink and catches decline.
Continue reading...
A prospecting company’s search for gold has the town of Lone Pine and Indigenous leaders on edge, as the Trump administration greenlights new projects across the American west
Lone Pine, population 1,882, lies along a stretch of California highway framed by the vast Inyo mountains and a sweeping desert landscape of sagebrush and dunes.
It’s the type of small town tourists drive through en route to Death Valley; where hikers get a motel room between Pacific Crest Trail treks. But amid the quiet downtown strip of bars and shops, there are signs of a battle brewing under the town’s sleepy surface.
Continue reading...
More than half of Ayetoro – a Christian utopia founded in the 1940s – has been lost to the ocean, and its remaining people are running out of options
In the early hours of 15 February 2019, the Atlantic Ocean came for Arowo Victoria’s livelihood. The 60-year-old retired midwife was asleep when neighbours began banging on her door, shouting that the sea had started covering buildings along the nearby coastline.
By the time she got to her small shop, she discovered that the Atlantic had already swept it away, destroying the business she had built with borrowed money after retirement.
Continue reading...
Trans-vakcenska kiselina (TVA), najzastupljenija transmasna kiselina koja se nalazi u majčinom mlijeku, pomaže u poticanju razvoja imunološkog sustava i ima dugotrajne učinke na zdravlje imunološkog sustava miševa, tvrdi nova studija.
Menopauza je povezana s nizom štetnih zdravstvenih učinaka, od kojih se neki mogu ublažiti nizom promjenjivih zdravstvenih ponašanja, uključujući prehranu, tjelovježbu i trajanje spavanja. Novo istraživanje nastojalo je utvrditi imaju li menopauza i status hormonske terapije ikakvu povezanost s promjenjivim zdravstvenim ponašanjima. Početni rezultati sugeriraju da veza postoji.
Mikroplastika – sićušni komadići plastike razgrađeni od većeg plastičnog otpada – sve su veća briga za ljudsko zdravlje, posebno za jetru. Sada nova studija pokazuje da je uobičajena vrsta mikroplastike posebno štetna za jetru u uvjetima prehrane s visokim udjelom masti.
Znanstvenici s Medicinskog fakulteta u Beču opisali su mehanizam u metastatskom raku debelog crijeva kojem se do sada posvećuje malo pažnje: ključna meta postojećih terapija, takozvani receptor epidermalnog faktora rasta (EGFR), vjerojatno utječe na više od samih stanica raka. Studija pokazuje da EGFR također utječe na određene imunološke stanice u mikrookruženju tumora - i time pomaže u određivanju koliko učinkovito vlastita obrana tijela može boriti se protiv tumora.
Lijek prethodno razvijen na UCLA-i kako bi pomogao srčanom tkivu da se popravi nakon srčanog udara također bi mogao pomoći u popravku i regeneraciji tkiva bubrega, pokazala je nova studija.
Prema rezultatima nove studije izgleda da odrasli koji jednostavno udišu pasivni dim cigareta imaju oko 1,5 puta više toksina kadmija u krvi od ljudi u okruženjima bez dima. Ovo je važna informacija jer se kadmij s vremenom nakuplja u tijelu i faktor je u raku bubrega, raku pluća i raku prostate.
Nova studija sugerira da bi jačanje prirodnih dnevnih ritmova tijela radi poboljšanja sna moglo pomoći mozgu da se oporavi nakon moždanog udara, što ukazuje na potencijalnu novu strategiju za poboljšanje uklanjanja otpada iz mozga i ishoda dugo nakon početne ozljede.
Vrsta bijelih krvnih stanica u imunološkom sustavu, poznata kao neutrofili, može smanjiti učinkovitost imunoterapije raka, tvrdi nova studija. Naime, rezultati pokazuju da signalna molekula u tumoru utječe na neutrofile, smanjujući učinak liječenja.
Dvostruko ciljana CAR T stanična terapija za rekurentni glioblastom (GBM), koja se primjenjuje izravno u cerebrospinalnu tekućinu (CSF), pokreće široki imunološki odgovor, s aktivacijom prirodnih stanica ubojica (NK) povezanom s boljim ishodima pacijenata i duljim ukupnim preživljavanjem, pokazuje nova studija.
Široko korišteni dodatak prehrani za zdravlje zglobova pod lupom je nakon što su znanstvenici povezali glukozamin s pogoršanim pamćenjem kod miševa s Alzheimerovom bolešću i lošijim ishodima u stvarnom svijetu kod osoba s demencijom.