USGS News: December Science Picks — Tis the Season for Frogs-a-Leaping, Climate Change and Boughs of … Minerals
Tuesday December 18th 2007
Filed Under USGS
USGS Office of Communications
Science Picks — Leads, Feeds and Story Seeds
December 2007 Edition
For Release: UPON RECEIPT
Winter can be cold and dreary … but these hot science leads and festive
science facts will warm your readers’ hearts! December Science Picks
take a look at holiday place names, mysterious mistletoe and the USGS
ice core laboratory along with a host of other tips (some timely, some
evergreen) on earth and natural science research and investigations.
Photos and Web links are available to enhance your story. If you would
like to receive Science Picks via e-mail, would like to change the
recipient or no longer want to receive it, please e-mail dmakle@usgs.gov
.
December Highlights:
· 58 Frogs-a-Leaping
· Through Frosty’s Eyes — A Look at the Importance of Coal
· A Chilly Clue to Global Climate Change
· Deck the Halls with Boughs of … Minerals?
· A Kiss is Just a Kiss — Mistletoe is So Much More
· Using Sediment to Determine Contamination
· Antarctica Awaits
· Tis the Season…For Holiday Place Names, That Is!
· Acid Rain Makes Shenandoah Streams Unfavorable to Fish
· It Takes a Rat to Raise a Joshua Tree
· From a Distance — For Northeast and Midwest Cause of Nitrate Falling
from the Sky Not Local
LEADS (top news, updates and happenings in natural science)
58 Frogs-a-Leaping: Since their August 2006 rescue (by USGS scientists)
from near-dry pools in a southern California creek, 58 tadpoles are now
sub-adult endangered mountain yellow-legged frogs, caroling for mates
and embracing suitors. With these youngsters, grow the hopes of the
multi-agency conservation effort to help restore the endangered frogs to
their mountain homes. Some of the frogs may form the core of a breeding
program, while others (when large enough to avoid predators) may one day
be returned to the wild. To learn more about this conservation effort,
contact USGS scientist Adam Backlin at (714) 508-4702 or
abacklin@usgs.gov or Catherine Puckett (352) 264-3532 or
cpuckett@usgs.gov.
Through Frosty’s Eyes — A Look at the Importance of Coal: In addition to
its use for snowmen’s features and filling the stockings of the naughty,
coal serves as an important energy resource for the United States. Coal
is used (combusted) to generate more than half of our country’s electric
power. One component of USGS coal research investigates the relations
between geologic processes, coal quality and the coal-combustion
products from power plants. Coal quality includes the study of coal
properties, such as the heating value, sulfur content and trace metal
concentrations found in coal. A tutorial on how this research is
conducted and its importance to society is available at the following
Web site: http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2007/1160/. For more information on
USGS coal quality research activities, please visit
http://energy.er.usgs.gov/coal_quality/index.htm or contact the USGS at
gd-energyprogram@usgs.gov, or call Jessica Robertson at (703) 624-6624
or jrobertson@usgs.gov.
A Chilly Clue to Global Climate Change: Ice cores from the ice-covered
regions of the Earth (Greenland and Antarctica) are our only continuous
record of the composition of the Earth’s atmosphere (including
“greenhouse gases”) over the past million years. They also give detailed
information about temperature, precipitation, volcanic eruptions, and
solar variability, helping researchers to better understand our changing
climate and environment. At the National Ice Core Lab in Denver, Colo.,
more than 16,000 meters of ice cores from Antarctica, Greenland and
other locations are carefully preserved at -33 degrees F. The lab is
operated by the USGS and jointly funded by the USGS and the National
Science Foundation (NSF). To learn more or to view the lab’s inventory,
check out http://nicl.usgs.gov/index.html or contact Todd Hinkley at
(303) 202-4830 or nicl@usgs.gov.
Deck the Halls with Boughs of … Minerals? Are cobalt oxide, sulfur and
cadmium sulfide used to make the traditional holiday hues in your
seasonal decorations? — Of course they are! According to USGS scientists
who collect worldwide data on almost all mineral resources, holiday
lights are made with these and other minerals from around the world. The
world’s supply of minerals — such as salt, manganese and lime — lights
up the holiday season, helping many nations and cultures to celebrate
their long-time traditions. In 2006, the mineral materials processed
domestically accounted for more than $542 billion in the U.S. economy.
To learn more about how minerals make the holidays shine and the economy
rolling, visit http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=1584. For
more information about other mineral related topics, visit the USGS
Mineral Resources Program Web site at http://minerals.usgs.gov/ or
contact Dennis Kostick at (703) 648-7715 or dkostick@usgs.gov.
A Kiss is Just a Kiss — Mistletoe is So Much More: This Christmas when
you pucker up under the mistletoe, consider this: while festive and fun,
mistletoe also provides essential food, cover and nesting sites for an
amazing number of birds, butterflies and mammals in the United States. C
heck out http://www.usgs.gov/mistletoe. There are more than 1300 types
of mistletoe worldwide, and more than 20 of them are endangered. And
mistletoe can be downright deceiving, as one USGS scientist learned on a
recent collaborative expedition to quantify perennial plant diversity in
Baja Norte and Baja Sur, Mexico, when he first encountered the “tree
with two kinds of flowers.” For more about this and other encounters
with mistletoe, contact Todd Esque at (702) 564-4506 or
todd_esque@usgs.gov.
Using Sediment to Determine Contamination: USGS scientists recently
conducted an assessment of bottom sediment in Kansas reservoirs and
streambed-sediment samples — Why? Common contaminants that affect
aquatic life might also affect human health. Findings suggest arsenic,
chromium, copper, lead, and nickel concentrations exceeded guidelines
for toxicity at some locations. The frequent detection of DDE at several
reservoirs indicates use of DDT was once widespread in the region. Learn
more about this and other sediment studies at
http://ks.water.usgs.gov/Kansas/studies/ressed/ or contact Kyle Juracek
at (785) 832-3527 or kjuracek@usgs.gov.
FEEDS (USGS tools and resources)
Antarctica Awaits: Take a quick and fun trip to the coldest continent,
Antarctica, without ever leaving the comforts of home or office. The
USGS, in collaboration with the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA) and the British Antarctic Survey, has completed
work on a unique and versatile map of Antarctica, the Landsat Image
Mosaic of Antarctica (http://lima.usgs.gov/). Using satellite imagery,
the mosaic combines more than 1100 hand-selected Landsat satellite
scenes digitally compiled to create a single, seamless, cloud-free image
— the most detailed and scientifically-accurate representation of the
continent. The project is one of several hundred funded in conjunction
with the International Polar Year, a two-year event that runs from March
2007 to March 2009 (http://www.doi.gov/issues/polar_year.html). For more
information contact Denver Makle at (703) 648-4732 or dmakle@usgs.gov.
Tis the Season…For Holiday Place Names, That Is! Are national holidays a
time or a place? For many, the holidays represent family gatherings with
delicious edibles, but for people who live in Christmas, Ariz.,
Mistletoe, Ky., Candle, Alaska, or Santa Claus, Ind., it is also a place
called home. This year, learn about holiday place names by using the
USGS Geographic Names Information System (GNIS). It is a fun and
exciting research tool containing over two million place names in the
United States. The database is used for local transportation planning,
regional planning and emergency preparedness. Many people also use it
as a genealogical tool, exploring their family name or history through
place names. The GNIS was developed with the U.S. Board on Geographic
Names to establish uniform name usage in the federal government and
provide an index of names on federal maps. Visit
http://geonames.usgs.gov/ to search for unique names of streams, lakes,
mountains, or populated places. For more, contact Denver Makle at (703)
648-4732 or dmakle@usgs.gov.
STORY SEEDS (points to ponder or investigate)
Acid Rain Makes Shenandoah Streams Unfavorable to Fish: Combine steep
slopes, small watersheds and underlying geology with acid rain and many
Shenandoah streams become inhospitable to native fish for extended
periods of time, according to a USGS scientist studying the effects of
acid rain on Shenandoah’s streams. Because of acid rain, Shenandoah is
the third most contaminated park in the national park system. To learn
why these high acid episodes occur at least once every two years,
contact Diane Noserale at (703) 648-4333 or dnoseral@usgs.gov.
It Takes a Rat to Raise a Joshua Tree: The fruits of Joshua trees, a
tree native to southwestern North America, in the states of California,
Arizona, Utah and Nevada, confined mostly to the Mojave Desert, do not
split open on their own. Instead, rodents dismantle them to harvest the
large seeds. According to a USGS and University of Nevada, Reno, study
recently published in Ecoscience, there is no other known means of
dispersing the seeds — seed-caching rodents are critical in the seed
dispersal process. Scientists tracked the spread of the seeds as rodents
carried and stored them in seed caches, usually within 30 meters of the
source plants. Although nearly all of the caches were emptied by the end
of winter, three stored seeds germinated in the spring and established
seedlings. To find out more, see
http://www.werc.usgs.gov/pubbriefs/esquepbmar2007.html or contact Todd
Esque at (702) 564-4506 or todd_esque@usgs.gov.
From a Distance — For Northeast and Midwest Cause of Nitrate Falling
from the Sky Not Local: Although vehicles are the single largest
emission source of nitrogen oxides in the northeastern and midwestern
United States, they probably are not the most important factor in
nitrate found in rain and snow across this region. Nitrate found in rain
and snow is not only caused by local sources, but sources found hundreds
of miles away. According to USGS scientists, stationary sources, such as
coal-burning power plants and other industrial facilities, have been
found to be a major cause of acid rain in rural areas of the
northeastern and Midwestern United States. To read the study’s abstract,
visit http://pubs.acs.org/journals/esthag/index.html or contact Emily
Elliott at 412-624-8882 or eelliott@pitt.edu