Climbing one of the world’s biggest granite walls is different from climbing trees, as National Park Service botanist Martin Hutten discovered while dangling from a cliff in the spray of Vernal Falls high above the Yosemite Valley. Hutten apprenticed in the logging industry before he started graduate school, so he new how to climb trees. “I could trust myself to a rope,” he recalls, “but I’d definitely never hung off a cliff or collected [samples] from a cliff.”
Category Archives: Features
Braving Iceland’s Volcano
The propeller-driven six-seater churns straight toward the brown plume over Eyjafjallajökull, unlike other aircraft taking off from Reykjavík airport. Inside, accompanied by a seasoned pilot, sits Björn Oddsson, a graduate student at the University of Iceland, entrusted with an infrared sensor derived from military bombing systems. But the only bombs Oddsson talks about are the lava boulders erupting from the volcano 80 miles away.
As they approach the volcano Oddsson opens the window so that the infrared sensor can function properly. A frigid wind whips in, chilling the cabin to near-Arctic temperatures, but Oddsson doesn’t mind; he is focused on calibrating the temperature scale on the device. The sensor, which looks like a video camera, is still relatively new and he’s eager to get it right. His supervisors expect him to report his findings at a briefing the next afternoon, April 19, the sixth day of the present eruption.
How green biotech turned white and blue
This year, midway through Argentina’s 2005–2015 Strategic Plan for Biotechnology, a long-stalled update of the Seed Law circulating in Buenos Aires may finally reach the legislative floor. The current law, which facilitated the rapid boom of transgenic crops in Argentina in the 1990s—60% of Argentina’s soy crop was genetically modified for herbicide resistance within three years of the introduction of Roundup Ready soy—is a source of conflict over intellectual property rights, as it permits farmers to retain seeds without paying royalties.
However, the meteoric rise in GM crop production was not solely the function of the seed law. Compatible agricultural practices in the early 1990s and a welcoming government contributed. Critics and fans alike say it’s a model from which other developing countries can learn important lessons. Continue reading How green biotech turned white and blue
Iceland Eruptions Fuel Interest in Volcanic Gas Monitoring
REYKJAVIK–As a brown cloud of ash drifts down from the slopes of Eyjafjallajökull toward their truck, Hanna Kaasalainen warns a colleague that their gas masks won’t be much good against carbon dioxide. The masks filter out poisonous gases released by magma such as sulfur dioxide, but carbon dioxide can simply displace oxygen in the air, asphyxiating the researchers as they take ash samples alongside a haze-enshrouded, deserted road. “We shouldn’t stay very long,” the University of Iceland geochemistry graduate student advises, before strapping on a bright yellow mask and opening the door. Continue reading Iceland Eruptions Fuel Interest in Volcanic Gas Monitoring