Environmental News

Global methane maps:

Pulse - GHGSat

 

Thylacines:

Australian Scientists Are Attempting To Bring The Thylacine Back From Extinction | IFLScience

There may be some good reasons not to do this, but I can only guess from great distance. Their justification, to help save other marsupials at brink of extinction, does not really grab me. There are surely lots of other things that could help with that.

 

Few sunken wooden ships in salt water last long. Shipworms are a mollusc and if your ship sinks where they live, buh-bye.

Wood at sea is not a novel food source, as driftwood has been supplied for 100's millions years.

Resist the urge to speculate that Antarctic region lacks shipworms because it does not supply driftwood. Resist.

 

As linked by @bisco . Endurance turns out to be a fitting name.

Probably has never been a ship named Teredo. That's just asking for it.

 

Pig heart lasts 2 months longer than its original owner:

US man who got 1st pig heart transplant dies after 2 months | AP News

There are other ways to describe this new medical procedure of course. I have had involvement with this topic, by word editing not gene editing. Several porcine genes making proteins that human immune systems react to, need to be suppressed. There are also some viruses needing to be dealt with. Pigs are grown in a very complicated way, and are actually partially humanized chimeras.

The few I saw were said to be worth USD$1 million each. Bacon for $9/lb? Big deal.

 

Evidence that growing more corn for bioethanol fuel does not improve greenhouse-gas situation:

https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2101084119

 

I think sugar cane area in Brazil peaked about 2015. They are now leaning into soy and corn. And leather which I fear will lead to bob posting another unforgettable image.

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PNAS article also had useful info on agric leakage of nitrogen and phosphorus.

 

While one can xenotransplant porcine organs, I guess we should not eat their meat. Seems canniballistic.

 

It should be wondered if global biological CO2 sinks are keeping up with new CO2 emission sources. They are:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04376-4

But paywalled! If I've taught y'all nothing, there it will stay.

 

Hunters (let us generously call them so) install lead (Pb) into uncollected targets. That lead kills up the food chain as well established (at least for vultures) in N Amer. And now, here;s Europe:

The impact of lead poisoning from ammunition sources on raptor populations in Europe - ScienceDirect

It is a fine thing, perhaps, that ammosexuals have broad freedoms to disperse these toxins. Freedoms! But other members of food chains there be, lacking choice and votes and Constitutional Amendments in their favor. So, they die.

I've linked another paywalled article, so see my previous comment.