Each year, power plants in the U.S. collectively kick out enough of this stuff to fill a train of coal cars stretching from Manhattan to Los Angeles and back three and a half times.

Smaller primates expend no more energy climbing than they do walking. This surprising discovery may explain the evolutionary edge that encouraged the tiny ancestors of modern humans, apes and monkeys to climb into the trees about 65 million years ago and stay there.

The newest analysis of trace gases trapped in Antarctic ice cores now provide a reasonable view of greenhouse gas concentrations as much as 800,000 years into the past, and are further confirming the link between greenhouse gas levels and global warming, scientists have reported in Nature.

Transplantation of muscle-derived stem cells may provide a safe and effective treatment for patients suffering from urinary incontinence following a surgical procedure. Patients with incontinence resulting from iatrogenic sphincter damage may benefit from this therapy.

The Etruscan shrew (Suncus etruscus) is one of the world's smallest mammals. It is about four centimetres long and weighs merely two grams. Being a nocturnal animal, it hunts predominantly with its sense of touch. "As quick as a flash, the Etruscan shrew scans its prey and adapts, when necessary, its hunting strategy," explained one of the researchers. "Thus, no prey escapes."

Scientists are investigating the characteristics of various types of materials for their use in the generation and measurement of precise movements. When the arms of a robot move to pick up an egg or an electric lamp, the greatest precision possible is essential. To this end, advances in the science and technology of materials have provided the design and control of systems equipped with sensors and actuators built with new materials.

Scientists have showed that lowering intake of the type of fat common in a Western diet helps prevent prostate cancer in mice, the first finding of its kind in a mouse model that closely mimics human cancer, researchers said. The study focused on fat from corn oil, which is made up primarily of omega-6 fatty acids, or the polyunsaturated fat commonly found in the Western diet.

As Charles Darwin showed nearly 150 years ago, bird beaks are exquisitely adapted to the birds' feeding strategy. A team of mathematicians and engineers has now explained exactly how some shorebirds use their long, thin beaks to defy gravity and transport food into their mouths. Some species rely exclusively on a feeding mechanism that takes advantage of water's surface tension, and so are extremely vulnerable to oil spills.

Scientists have improved the efficiency of an important type of solar cell from 21.9 to 23.2 percent (a relative improvement of 6 per cent). The efficiency improvement is achieved by the use of an ultra-thin aluminum oxide layer at the front of the cell, and it brings a breakthrough in the use of solar energy a step closer. The costs of applying the thin layer of aluminum oxide are expected to be relatively low.

Losing weight may help resolve erectile dysfunction in obese men. Morbid obesity can cause sexual dysfunction independent of other common confounders, including diabetes, hypertension and smoking.

Carbon-coated nanomagnets may offer a new form of cancer treatment. New research suggests that nanoparticles consisting of metallic iron with a protective carbon coat could serve as a safe and effective hyperthermia agent.

Genes known to cause spinal mutations in chick and mouse model systems also play an important role in human patients with congenital vertebral abnormalities. Working with samples from 31 patients at Boston Children's Hospital with various congenital vertebral defects, the team sequenced five genes thought to be involved in the malformations.

By targeting a common virus, doctors may be able to extend the lives of patients diagnosed with the most prevalent and deadly type of brain tumor. A type of herpes virus called human cytomegalovirus (CMV) is found in up to 80 percent of Americans, though the virus normally produces very few clinical symptoms, is dormant, and usually undetectable in most people.

Today's New York Times profiles young families joining the "voluntary simplicity" movement (Chasing Utopia, Family Imagines No Possessions): seemingly a cultural residue of Kerouac's "On The Road" and CSN's 1975 hit "Wooden Ships" Wooden ships on the water very free and easy. Easy you know the way it's supposed to be TreeHugger writer Lloyd recently profiled the related Survivalism is the New Black...

Mayor's Youth Council getting organized
Laurel Leader Call, MS - 1 hour ago
The youth council, which has advisors, is also led by youth leaders, Corbin McDavitt as president and Joshua Agee as vice president. ...

Beyond the “Creed of Nice” Re-examining Youth Religious Practices
MorungExpress, India - 1 hour ago
Our new youth director is so nice and we are so happy for her; our youth are doing very well, and especially new youth leaders are all “nice people. ...

"So drinking bottled water is like giving my car a blowjob?" The question above, posed by copyranter in the title of an article panning Brita's new advertising campaign, got our attention. Brita's approach may be crude, (no pun intended), but such reactions will certainly contribute to achieving Brita's goal. More clicks. More people aware that ...

The current US Administration projects a consistent message on the deepening risk of climate crisis: 23 year's worth of forward looking cognitive dissonance. One has only to consider the vision expressed in two simple bar graphics, excerpted here from a presentation given recently by the Director of the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), to see what the whole world clearly senses. All that is lacking is marker at on the far right of the X-Axis that says 'who could have guessed this would happen.'...

Youth@HamRadio.Fun: 73 from KG4IUM -- Youth Lounges Everywhere
ARRL, CT - 3 hours ago
Youth leaders are on hand to assist youngsters with crafts and activities relating to ham radio -- among these are scavenger hunts, fox hunts, ...

Scientists Oliver Pergams and Patty Zaradic have coined the term “videophilia” to describe “the new human tendency to focus on sedentary activities involving electronic media”.1 So humans now seem to suffer from an ailment involving a craze for nature as delivered through various media–TV shows, movies, magazines, pictures, etc. Rather than getting out and getting dirty, many folks are “experiencing” the natural world from the comfort of their couch, remote in hand, HDTV set to “stunning,” sound system at full blast, and snacks and drinks within arm’s reach. Lights! Camera! Action!

Having received the Planet Earth complete series on DVD as a birthday gift this year, I have witnessed just how fascinating and enlightening these presentations of the Earth can be. After watching the series (I was hooked after the very first episode), I felt a newfound respect for the Earth; equally powerful was a sense of dedication to preserving all of those wonderful things that the show explored. And there is no way I would have been able to go to the Himalayas, to the African deserts, to the depths of the oceans, to both poles, or to so many other places. Simply put, this birthday gift was one of the best I have ever gotten. (THANKS MOM!)

Through secondhand knowledge (I do not own a television myself), I understand just how popular nature-related programs have become on TV. Thanks to channels like Animal Planet, the Discovery Channel, and PBS, the Earth has become quite a “celebrity” on the small (and, in some cases, big) screen. Like me with Planet Earth, then, millions of people across the planet are gaining new insights about the planet they live and depend upon; perhaps they are gaining newfound respect and love for that planet, too.

So I commend all of these media outlets for what they have done in making the Earth a modern-day pop star. At their best, they provide knowledge that would never be acquired (or even pursued?) otherwise.

But, skeptic and pessimist and Luddite that I am, I have to agree with Pergams and Zaradic in their concerns about this outbreak of videophilia. Those same HDTV screens can be double-edged swords, since the comfort and convenience of nature-on-the-screen all too easily makes the real natural world dispensable, as it were. Why go outside and look at the same old trees and flowers and birds and critters when you can see exotic species, faraway landscapes, and unsolved mysteries in a climate-controlled, hi-def, fully snacked world inside your house? Why bother preserving nature if it is already “preserved” on a DVD or TV reruns?

You may see where I am going with this. Doctors and teachers and parents and so many other concerned individuals are warning us about spending too much time in front of various technological screens–from computers to iPods to cell phones. Whether it be obesity, ADD, or broken familial/social bonds, the drawbacks of a “wired” culture are ample and fully evident in virtually every culture today.

As a result, a “lazy-man’s” nature is only one more method for being a spectator rather than a participant. Instead of burning calories and building muscle weeding the garden, climbing a hill, or maneuvering a kayak, people who are exclusively spectators of nature-on-the-screen gain none of the health benefits that being active in nature provides.

Even worse, they gain none of the HEART benefits that being active in nature provides.

After all, we humans are in truth “animals” ourselves (though whether we are “higher animals” is open to question, I think). We are an integral chain in the food chain, a living member of the planetary body, an irreplaceable element of the holistic homeostasis that is nature. Without us, nature is not fully nature, Earth is not fully Earth. As William Blake said, “Where man is not nature is barren.”2

This “tuning out” of Nature in order to “tune in” to nature-on-the-screen is a tragedy.

Having gotten a PhD, I honestly believe I have learned more from being out in the garden, taking a walk every day (rain or shine!), and putting up bird feeders than I did in all those years of schooling.

Having experienced the ability that nature has literally to save a person, if he or she opens up and tunes in to the power and glory available in every single tiny little pixel in the Earth’s big screen, I honestly believe that nature is at its best when we are out participating in/with it.

Having dedicated myself to helping preserve nature so that others may experience the same magic that I have, I honestly believe that nature-on-the-screen may become too “virtual” for people to feel as dedicated to preserving it, since they might not gain the same direct, firsthand experience of nature’s powers.

By all means, then, let the screens be set aglow with images of lions chasing wildebeest, snow blanketing Mt. Everest, humpback whales plumbing the oceanic depths…. Lights! Camera! Action!

But please, oh please oh please, at least go outside and roll around in the grass during commercials!

Notes
Image credit: Belinda Hankins Miller via Flickr.
1. Pergams, Oliver R. W., and Patricia A. Zaradic. “Is love of nature in the US becoming love of electronic media? 16-year downtrend in national park visits explained by watching movies, playing video games, internet use, and oil prices.” Journal of Environmental Management 80 (2006): 387.
2. Blake, William. The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. The Complete Poetry and Prose of William Blake. Ed. David V. Erdman. With commentary by Harold Bloom. Newly rev. ed. New York: Anchor-Doubleday, 1998. 38.