PARIS, FRANCE/ New scenarios for the IPCC are on top the table. Emissions of the main greenhouse gases, reactive gaseous and particulate chemical compounds have been inventoried over the period 1850-2300.

The work was done in a international collaboration involving scientists from the Laboratoire "Atmosphères, Milieux, Observations Spatiales" and the Laboratoire d'Aérologie. 

JENA, DEUTSCHLAND/ Soils store more carbon than the atmosphere and living plants. But scientists don’t know why some organic compounds persist for centuries or even thousands of years in soils, while others quickly decompose.

This longstanding mystery is addressed in a review by the University of Zurich’s Michael Schmidt, Susan Trumbore from Max Planck Institute of Biogeochemistry in Jena and an international team of scientists.

SAO PAULO, BRAZIL/ An article in the current issue of the Journal Global Change Biology Bioenergy reviews the history and current state of ethanol production of sugarcane in Brazil and presents a strategy for improving future ecosystem services and production.

Researchers introduce a new approach that prioritizes a sustainable and responsible way of producing ethanol called the “midway” strategy.

SINGAPORE, SINGAPORE/ The Singapore National Research Foundation (NRF) will invest up to US$8.2 million over 5 years in a new rice research programme to help ensure there is enough rice to meet the future demands of Singapore and the region.

The granted are researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) and Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory (TLL) and the support will be part to ensure food security in the region.

MANCHESTER, UNITED KINGDOM/ The UK Committee on Climate Change (CCC) that global carbon emissions can peak by 2016, but researchers have questioned this ambitious assumption.

Whilst the researchers agree that global emissions should peak ‘as soon as possible’, an aim agreed by the United Nations at a 2010 conference, a new research suggests that 2016 is implausibly early.

VERMONT, UNITED STATES/ For decades  was thought that rainfall is the biggest driver of erosion, also that semi-arid landscapes with little vegetation and occasional major storms were understood to have the greatest rates of erosion.

Every mountain and hill shall be made low, declared the ancient prophet Isaiah. In other words: erosion happens. But for the modern geologist a vexing question remains: how fast does this erosion happen?

MERCED, UNITED STATES/ An increase in wildfires due to climate change could rapidly and profoundly alter the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

A new study authored by the University of California, Merced, suggests that the expected rising temperatures caused by climate change could increase the frequency of large wildfires in Yellowstone to an unprecedented level.

DÜBENDORF, SWITZERLAND/ Times for Biofuels are not easy, first hailed as a way to a sustainable energy supply, have since fallen out of favor because of the overall negative impact they have on the environment.

One of the main problems faced by Biofuels is related to its production that is mainly not sustainable and it is direct related to planting cycles. Then, storages might be built in order to start reaching reserves and for these purposes accurate information is required.

LEICESTER, UNITED KINGDOM/ Student of the University of Leicester has identified an environmentally alternative to a major industrial use of oil. The researcher has discovered a way to treat palm kernel oil so that it can be used to insulate electrical transformers.

Transformers use petroleum-derived oil as insulation between electrical components but this makes them reliant on fossil fuels and also causes environmental problems if there is a leak. The research is being presented at the Festival of Postgraduate Research on Thursday, 16 June, in Leicester.

NEW YORK, UNITED STATES/ Lighting technology touches nearly everything we do, from illuminating our homes and workplaces, to making a left turn at an intersection, or snapping a photo with a cellphone.

Given the sheer ubiquity of lighting, it’s easy to take the technology for granted, but lighting is the subject of intense scrutiny by scientists at two Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute research centers.