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Overnight News Digest: Electricity from thin air, flesh eating seaweed, & more science thrills [1]

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Date: 2023-05-27  

A severe and sudden weather phenomenon known as a flash drought is increasingly catching the attention of climate scientists due to its potential to significantly impact agricultural and ecological systems. The ripple effects of such events can resonate far beyond their immediate environments. A team of researchers at the University of Oklahoma is digging deeper into this concern, particularly focusing on how our ever-warming climate might influence the frequency of these flash droughts and the ensuing risks posed to global cropland. [...] “We anticipate a 1.5 times increase in the annual risk of flash droughts over croplands across North America by 2100, from the 2015 baseline of a 32% yearly risk in 2015 to 49% in 2100,” said Christian. “Europe, on the other hand, is expected to face the most significant increase in the most extreme emissions scenario, witnessing an increase from 32% to 53%, a 1.7 times increase in annual risk.”

x Spiny mice were already pretty strange and they’re getting stranger https://t.co/Q21xKBZhCF — NYT Science (@NYTScience) May 27, 2023

At first it looks like a slightly more hairy rodent. But the spiny mouse’s body is full of secrets. Found in rock outcrops throughout Africa and Europe, its back is full of porcupine-like quills made of stiffened fur. It has soft, easily torn skin and a remarkable ability to regenerate, like a species of desert gecko. Now, researchers have revealed another surprise in the journal iScience on Wednesday: Their tails are lined with osteoderms, or bony plates, making them only the second group of living mammals known to be equipped with underskin armor like an armadillo. “Although spiny mice are widely known and commonly used in all sorts of lab experiments, nobody had ever noticed they had these,” said Edward Stanley, a biologist at the Florida Museum of Natural History and an author on the study.

Antarctica sets the stage for the world's greatest waterfall. The action takes place beneath the surface of the ocean. Here, trillions of tons of cold, dense, oxygen-rich water cascade off the continental shelf and sink to great depths. This Antarctic "bottom water" then spreads north along the sea floor in deep ocean currents, before slowly rising, thousands of kilometers away. In this way, Antarctica drives a global network of ocean currents called the "overturning circulation" that redistributes heat, carbon and nutrients around the globe. The overturning is crucial to keeping Earth's climate stable. It's also the main way oxygen reaches the deep ocean. But there are signs this circulation is slowing down and it's happening decades earlier than predicted. This slowdown has the potential to disrupt the connection between the Antarctic coasts and the deep ocean, with profound consequences for Earth's climate, sea level and marine life.

Most people were already aware of the 5,000-mile long sargassum bloom making its way toward Florida -- and possibly Alabama -- beaches, but thanks to a new study, there’s more to be concerned about than just the stench which accompanies the bloom. Florida Atlantic University has released a study which found that sargassum bloom contains both the Vibrio bacteria and plastic marine debris, creating what the study’s authors called a “perfect pathogen storm” with significant health risks to both humans and marine life.

x “The big gap is just understanding what is happening in the Arctic in general,” on researcher said. “This study shows why we need long-term projects to understand the changes happening across different levels.” https://t.co/75FEzbLFWH — NYT Science (@NYTScience) May 27, 2023

Male Arctic ground squirrels go through puberty every year. As if that wasn’t hard enough, now the females have a problem, too. According to a paper published on Thursday in the journal Science, climate change appears to be making them emerge from hibernation earlier. That matters, because it could throw off the timing of the animals’ mating cycle. Typically, males come out of hibernation before females to prepare for the spring mating season. They need time to reach sexual maturity again, every year, because their testosterone levels drop sharply during the winter. Then, the females wake up. But scientists have found that as temperatures rise, female ground squirrels are emerging up to 10 days earlier than they used to. Researchers think it has to do with earlier thawing of the soil.

US study finds 1 in 10 get long COVID after omicron, starts identifying key symptoms — medical xpress

The new research, published Thursday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, includes more than 8,600 adults who had COVID-19 at different points in the pandemic, comparing them to another 1,100 who hadn't been infected. By some estimates, roughly 1 in 3 of COVID-19 patients have experienced long COVID. That's similar to NIH study participants who reported getting sick before the omicron variant began spreading in the U.S. in December 2021. That's also when the study opened, and researchers noted that people who already had long COVID symptoms might have been more likely to enroll. But about 2,230 patients had their first coronavirus infection after the study started, allowing them to report symptoms in real time -– and only about 10% experienced long-term symptoms after six months. [...] The new study zeroed in on a dozen symptoms that may help define long COVID: fatigue; brain fog; dizziness; gastrointestinal symptoms; heart palpitations; sexual problems; loss of smell or taste; thirst; chronic cough; chest pain; worsening symptoms after activity and abnormal movements.

x The octopus goes from being completely still to thrashing around and releasing a cloud of ink before gripping a piece of pipe. It could have been a nightmare. https://t.co/3M6hj83rDB — NYT Science (@NYTScience) May 27, 2023

Costello the octopus was napping while stuck to the glass of his tank at the Rockefeller University in New York. He snoozed quietly for half an hour, and then entered a more active sleep stage, his skin cycling through colors and textures used for camouflage — typical behavior for a cephalopod. But soon things became strange. A minute later, Costello scuttled along the glass toward his tank’s sandy bottom, curling his arms over his body. Then he spun like a writhing cyclone. Finally, Costello swooped down and clouded half of his tank with ink. As the tank’s filtration system cleared the ink, Eric Angel Ramos, a marine scientist, noticed that Costello was grasping a pipe with unusual intensity, “looking like he was trying to kill it,” he said. [...] “We were completely dumbfounded,” said Marcelo O. Magnasco, a biophysicist at Rockefeller. Perhaps Costello was having a nightmare, he and a team of researchers speculated. They shared this idea and other possible explanations in a study uploaded this month to the bioRxiv website. It has yet to be formally reviewed by other scientists.

Cooper also has a great OpEd in the NYT: Three Years After a Fateful Day in Central Park, Birding Continues to Change My Life

x Remember Christian Cooper? Central Park Karen tried to tell 911 he was threatening her when all he was doing was birdwatching. Karen lost her job and Christian got a new job. He'll be the host for National Geographic's new show "Extraordinary Birder". pic.twitter.com/hHXj2kmfyW — Frantz Fanon (@jwillia2) May 26, 2023

Deep sea surveys detect over five thousand new species in future mining hotspot — science daily

There is a massive, mineral-rich region in the Pacific Ocean -- about twice the size of India -- called the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ), which has already been divided up and assigned to companies for future deep-sea mining. To better understand what may be at risk once companies start mining, a team of biologists has built the first 'CCZ checklist' by compiling all the species records from previous research expeditions to the region. Their estimates of the species diversity of the CCZ included a total of 5,578 different species, an estimated 88% - 92% of which are entirely new to science.

If you've ever wished you had X-ray vision, NASA has some photos for you. NASA has released four composite images using data from several of its most advanced telescopes to depict our universe in different wavelengths of light, including data collected by the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Hubble Space Telescope. The images , which show two galaxies, a star cluster, and a nebula, are rendered in dazzling colors representing X-ray and infrared radiation, as well as optical light.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/5/27/2171759/-Overnight-News-Digest-Electricity-from-thin-air-flesh-eating-seaweed-amp-more-science-thrills

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