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Glacier grief: how funerals and rituals can help us mourn the loss of nature

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Monday, October 10, 2022

From mountain top ceremonies to immersive art, people are finding new ways to express feelings of grief – and guilt – when nature ‘dies’It was in 2016 that Cymene Howe, a scholar at Rice University, Texas, first heard of the “death” of Okjökull, a small icecap in western Iceland, two years earlier.Glaciers are charismatic, with snouts and tongues of ice that crawl over land as they grow, but when their ice becomes too thin to continue moving – an increasingly common event amid rising temperatures – the glacier is pronounced dead. Continue reading...

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Can AI and Big Data Solve Latin America’s Farming Woes?

For centuries, farmers used almanacs to try to predict nature. Now, a new generation of Latin American start-ups is helping to achieve this with artificial intelligence tools that promise an agricultural revolution in giants like Brazil. Aline Oliveira Pezente, a 39-year-old entrepreneur from the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais (southeast), was working at the multinational Louis Dreyfus Commodities when she noticed a problem in the industry dynamics in Brazil, the world’s largest exporter of soybeans, corn, and beef. Producers need large upfront loans to buy inputs such as seeds and fertilizers, she explains. But they face caution from lenders in the face of countless risks, both natural (droughts, floods, crop diseases…) and financial (bankruptcies, price drops, and more). Aline and her husband, Fabricio, decided to study the problem at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States, where she obtained a master’s degree and specialized in artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics. In 2018, they launched the start-up Traive, which collects massive amounts of agriculture-related data and then analyzes it with artificial intelligence to define risks for lenders and provide greater access to credit for farmers. “Lenders used to use their own model (of risk analysis), like a giant Excel file. But it’s very difficult for humans, even with extensive knowledge of statistics and mathematics, to create equations that capture all the nuances,” said Aline. Now “we can do in five minutes and with much greater precision what used to take three months,” she said. AI for agriculture Seven years later, Traive’s clients include agribusiness giants such as Syngenta, financial technology companies, and Latin America’s second-largest bank, Banco do Brasil. More than 70,000 producers use its platform, which facilitated almost $1 billion in financial transactions, says Aline. The entrepreneur presented her work this week at the Web Summit in Rio de Janeiro, a major technology event called “Davos for geeks”. Traive participated in a panel titled “Data Harvest: The Next Agricultural Revolution,” in which Alejandro Mieses, also an entrepreneur, addressed the potential of AI in the sector. Farmers are increasingly turning to this tool to increase their yields and returns, with applications such as autonomous tractors, drones that track crop health, and intelligent cameras that recognize weeds for herbicide treatment. TerraFirma, Mieses’ start-up based in Puerto Rico, developed an AI model that uses satellite imagery to forecast environmental risks such as natural disasters, crop diseases, and erosion. “We insist on physics because we believe that is the starting point. We must understand how water moves, wind, how different solar exposures act on crops,” he highlighted at the Web Summit, whose edition this year had AFP as an associated media. The difficulty, according to the panelists, is that AI models must be trained with massive amounts of data in a complex process. “It demands quite a few resources: servers, an immense data warehouse are needed,” said Mieses, 39. The result depends on the quality of the data. Agriculture vs. climate The agricultural industry faces criticism in countries like Brazil, whose rise as a sector powerhouse has also seen an increase in environmental destruction in key regions such as the Amazon rainforest, considered vital against climate change. Innovation optimists argue that, given that the world’s population is expected to reach nearly 10 billion by 2050, technologies such as AI are humanity’s best hope for survival without destroying the planet. Mariana Vasconcelos, 32, is the CEO of the Brazilian start-up Agrosmart, which uses AI to help farmers manage climate risks and produce more sustainably. “The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization says we need to increase food production to supply a growing population. At the same time, we have to produce with less land, less deforestation, less carbon footprint. How can we do it without technology?” she asked. Although agriculture is often opposed to nature, “technology is proving that it can actually restore the environment, work together with nature… Agriculture is moving towards a more sustainable model,” she concluded. The post Can AI and Big Data Solve Latin America’s Farming Woes? appeared first on The Tico Times | Costa Rica News | Travel | Real Estate.

Nature

Agriculture

Climate

Precision Spectroscopy Now Possible Under Starved-Light Conditions

In a study recently published in Nature, researchers from the Max Born Institute in Berlin, Germany, and the Max-Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching...

An ultraviolet photon-counting dual-comb spectrometer. Two ultraviolet frequency combs of slightly different pulse repetition frequencies are generated at very low light levels by nonlinear frequency conversion of near-infrared combs. One ultraviolet comb passes through a sample. The two feeble combs are then superimposed with a beam splitter and detected by a photon-counting detector. At power levels more than one million times weaker than usually employed, the statistics of the detected photons carries the information about the sample with its possibly highly complex optical spectrum. Credit: T.W. Hänsch (MPI of Quantum Optics) and N. Picqué (MPI of Quantum Optics, Max Born Institute).In a study recently published in Nature, researchers from the Max Born Institute in Berlin, Germany, and the Max-Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching have unveiled a new technique for deciphering the properties of matter with light, that can simultaneously detect and precisely quantify many substances with a high chemical selectivity.Their technique interrogates the atoms and molecules in the ultraviolet spectral region at very feeble light levels. Using two optical frequency combs and a photon counter, the experiments open up exciting prospects for conducting dual-comb spectroscopy in low-light conditions and they pave the way for novel applications of photon-level diagnostics, such as precision spectroscopy of single atoms or molecules for fundamental tests of physics and ultraviolet photochemistry in the Earth’s atmosphere or from space telescopes.Advancements in Ultraviolet SpectroscopyUltraviolet spectroscopy plays a critical role in the study of electronic transitions in atoms and rovibronic transitions in molecules. These studies are essential for tests of fundamental physics, quantum-electrodynamics theory, determination of fundamental constants, precision measurements, optical clocks, high-resolution spectroscopy in support of atmospheric chemistry and astrophysics, and strong-field physics. Scientists in the group of Nathalie Picqué have now made a significant leap in the field of ultraviolet spectroscopy by successfully implementing high-resolution linear-absorption dual-comb spectroscopy in the ultraviolet spectral range. This groundbreaking achievement opens up new possibilities for performing experiments under low-light conditions, paving the way for novel applications in various scientific and technological fields.Principles and Challenges of Dual-Comb SpectroscopyDual-comb spectroscopy, a powerful technique for precise spectroscopy over broad spectral bandwidths, has been mainly used for infrared linear absorption of small molecules in the gas phase. It relies on measuring the time-dependent interference between two frequency combs with slightly different repetition frequencies. A frequency comb is a spectrum of evenly spaced, phase-coherent laser lines, that acts like a ruler to measure the frequency of light with extreme precision. The dual-comb technique does not suffer from the geometric limitations associated with traditional spectrometers, and offers great potential for high precision and accuracy.However, dual-comb spectroscopy typically requires intense laser beams, making it less suitable for scenarios where low light levels are critical. The team has now experimentally demonstrated that dual-comb spectroscopy can be effectively employed in starved-light conditions, at power levels more than a million times weaker than those typically used.This breakthrough was achieved using two distinct experimental setups with different types of frequency-comb generators. The team developed a photon-level interferometer that accurately records the statistics of photon counting, showcasing a signal-to-noise ratio at the fundamental limit. This achievement highlights the optimal use of available light for experiments, and opens up the prospect of dual-comb spectroscopy in challenging scenarios where low light levels are essential.Overcoming Technical Challenges and Future ApplicationsThe researchers addressed the challenges associated with generating ultraviolet frequency combs and building dual-comb interferometers with long coherence times, paving the way for advances in this coveted goal. They exquisitely controlled the mutual coherence of two comb lasers with one femtowatt per comb line, demonstrating an optimal build-up of the counting statistics of their interference signal over times exceeding one hour. “Our innovative approach to low-light interferometry overcomes the challenges posed by the low efficiency of nonlinear frequency conversion, and lays a solid foundation for extending dual-comb spectroscopy to even shorter wavelengths,” comments Bingxin Xu, the post-doctoral scientist who led the experiments.Indeed, a compelling future application is the development of dual-comb spectroscopy at short wavelengths, to enable precise vacuum- and extreme-ultraviolet molecular spectroscopy over broad spectral spans. Currently, broadband extreme-UV spectroscopy is limited in resolution and accuracy, and relies on unique instrumentation at specialized facilities.“Ultraviolet dual-comb spectroscopy, while a challenging goal, has now become a realistic one as a result of our research. Importantly, our results extend the full capabilities of dual-comb spectroscopy to low-light conditions, unlocking novel applications in precision spectroscopy, biomedical sensing, and environmental atmospheric sounding. On a more personal note, this milestone results from an experiment performed at the Max-Planck Institute of Quantum Optics and completed whereas I had already taken up my position of director at the Max Born Institute. I can not imagine a more thrilling way to transition to a new institute. MBI will now host our next exciting experiments in this field!” Nathalie Picqué concludes.The development of dual-comb spectroscopy in the short wavelength range promises advances in several scientific and technological fields, underscoring the importance of this achievement.Reference: “Near-ultraviolet photon-counting dual-comb spectroscopy” by Bingxin Xu, Zaijun Chen, Theodor W. Hänsch and Nathalie Picqué, 6 March 2024, Nature.DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07094-9

Nature

Chemicals

NASA Uncovers the Hidden Forces Behind the Sun’s Mysterious Moss

NASA research has uncovered how electrical currents and tangled magnetic fields heat the Sun’s mossy regions from 10,000 to 1 million degrees Fahrenheit, aiding in...

At the center of this image (left) from NASA’s High Resolution Coronal Imager sounding rocket is a small-scale, patchy structure on the Sun that solar physicists call “moss.” It forms low in the solar atmosphere around the center of sunspot groups on the Sun where magnetic activity is strong. An image from NASA’s Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph, or IRIS, mission shows a detailed scenery of the cooler roots of moss (right). Credit: NASA/Bose et al 2024NASA research has uncovered how electrical currents and tangled magnetic fields heat the Sun’s mossy regions from 10,000 to 1 million degrees Fahrenheit, aiding in understanding solar atmospheric heating.Did you know the Sun has moss? Due to its resemblance to the earthly plants, scientists have named a small-scale, bright, patchy structure made of plasma in the solar atmosphere “moss.” This moss, which was first identified in 1999 by NASA’s TRACE mission, blossoms around the center of a sunspot group, where magnetic conditions are strong. It straddles two atmospheric layers known as the chromosphere and corona and hides below the long feathery ropes of plasma known as coronal loops.Research on Solar MossFor decades, scientists have struggled to understand how this mossy region is connected to the Sun’s lower atmospheric layers and how material there is heated from 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit up to nearly 1 million degrees Fahrenheit — 100 times hotter than the bright surface just below. Now, research enabled by NASA’s High Resolution Coronal Imager (Hi-C) sounding rocket and NASA’s Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) mission have given scientists insights into the superheating mechanism at play in the moss. Advances in Understanding Solar HeatingObservations from these instruments combined with complex 3D simulations have now revealed that electrical currents may contribute to heating the moss. Throughout this region there is a mess of magnetic field lines, like invisible spaghetti. This tangle of magnetic spaghetti creates electrical currents that can help heat material to a wide range of temperatures from 10,000 to 1 million degrees Fahrenheit. This local heating in the moss appears to occur in addition to heat flowing from the hot, multi-million-degree overlying corona. This insight, published in the journal Nature Astronomy on April 15, can help scientists understand the larger question of why the Sun’s entire corona is so much hotter than the surface.Future Research and Missions“Thanks to the high-resolution observations and our advanced numerical simulations, we’re able to figure out part of this mystery that’s stumped us for the past quarter of a century,” said author Souvik Bose, a research scientist at Lockheed Martin Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory and Bay Area Environmental Institute, NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. “However, this is just a piece of the puzzle; it doesn’t solve the whole problem.”For that, many more observations are needed. Some are coming soon: Hi-C is scheduled to launch again this month to capture a solar flare, and it may also capture another moss region together with IRIS. However, to obtain observations that can fully address how the corona and moss are heated, scientists and engineers are working to develop new instruments onboard the future MUlti-slit Solar Explorer (MUSE) mission.IRIS and TRACE are part of NASA’s Explorers Program.Reference: “Chromospheric and coronal heating in an active region plage by dissipation of currents from braiding” by Souvik Bose, Bart De Pontieu, Viggo Hansteen, Alberto Sainz Dalda, Sabrina Savage and Amy Winebarger, 15 April 2024, Nature Astronomy.DOI: 10.1038/s41550-024-02241-8

Nature

Find a hidden wildflower paradise at Camassia Natural Area in West Linn

The small nature preserve is a rainbow of color in the spring.

It doesn’t look like much at first – a small, gravel parking area at the end of a neighborhood street in West Linn, a couple of signs in the trees – but soon the splendor of Camassia comes alive.Officially known as the Camassia Natural Area, a 26-acre nature preserve is home to more than 300 plant species, including wildflowers that bloom in April and May and turn the grassy plateau into a colorful display.Managed by international environmental nonprofit The Nature Conservancy, the Camassia preserve is tucked away in plain sight, bordered by Interstate 205, West Linn High School and quiet neighborhood streets. If you didn’t frequent the area, or didn’t know to look for it, you might never find it.Walking distance from downtown Oregon City, the preserve can also be counted as one among many easily accessible outdoor attractions in the area, alongside the McLoughlin Promenade, Newell Creek Canyon Nature Park and Mary S. Young Park.And though Camassia is nice any time of year, there’s nothing like the spring.Shortspur seablush wildflowers bloom at Camassia Nature Preserve.Jamie Hale/The OregonianA boardwalk trail through a boggy forest is found on a side trail.Jamie Hale/The OregonianTrillium wildflowers bloom in the shade of a conifer.Jamie Hale/The OregonianA fawn lily blooms in a wooded area on a side trail.Jamie Hale/The OregonianA hazy view of Mount Hood is found on a viewpoint at the edge of the preserve.Jamie Hale/The OregonianOn a recent visit in the middle of April, the meadows and forests of the preserve were a rainbow of wildflowers. Pretty white trillium flowers and fawn lilies bloomed in the shade of conifers. Purple camas lilies and pink sea blush flowers filled the grassy meadows. Yellow blooming Oregon grape filled the spaces in between, beside giant blue-eyed Mary, little yellow violets and many delicate white blossoms.A half-mile one-way loop trail circles the preserve, running on boardwalks, dirt trails and rocky paths. Several short offshoot trails lead to other corners of the natural area, leading to the high school, other neighborhood entrances and neighboring Wilderness Park. It’s worth exploring them all, if only for a short distance.You could tour the whole place in a matter of minutes, but you’re better off taking it slow, observing the many different species and the lovely, intricate ecosystem that they call home.To find the Camassia Natural Area, take Oregon 43 south from Portland for 10 miles to West Linn. Turn right onto West A Street, then go right onto Willamette Falls Drive. In .2 miles, turn right onto Sunset Avenue, and in .1 miles turn right onto Walnut Street. The parking area is at the end of the street. If full, find a place to safely park being mindful and respectful of the neighbors.--Jamie Hale covers travel and the outdoors and co-hosts the Peak Northwest podcast. Reach him at 503-294-4077, jhale@oregonian.com or @HaleJamesB.Our journalism needs your support. Subscribe today to OregonLive.com.

Nature

Forests

World faces ‘deathly silence’ of nature as wildlife disappears, warn experts

Loss of intensity and diversity of noises in ecosystems reflects an alarming decline in healthy biodiversity, say sound ecologistsRead more: No birdsong, no water in the creek, no beating wings: how a haven for nature fell silentSounds of the natural world are rapidly falling silent and will become “acoustic fossils” without urgent action to halt environmental destruction, international experts have warned.As technology develops, sound has become an increasingly important way of measuring the health and biodiversity of ecosystems: our forests, soils and oceans all produce their own acoustic signatures. Scientists who use ecoacoustics to measure habitats and species say that quiet is falling across thousands of habitats, as the planet witnesses extraordinary losses in the density and variety of species. Disappearing or losing volume along with them are many familiar sounds: the morning calls of birds, rustle of mammals through undergrowth and summer hum of insects. Continue reading...

Sounds of the natural world are rapidly falling silent and will become “acoustic fossils” without urgent action to halt environmental destruction, international experts have warned.As technology develops, sound has become an increasingly important way of measuring the health and biodiversity of ecosystems: our forests, soils and oceans all produce their own acoustic signatures. Scientists who use ecoacoustics to measure habitats and species say that quiet is falling across thousands of habitats, as the planet witnesses extraordinary losses in the density and variety of species. Disappearing or losing volume along with them are many familiar sounds: the morning calls of birds, rustle of mammals through undergrowth and summer hum of insects.Today, tuning into some ecosystems reveals a “deathly silence”, said Prof Steve Simpson from the University of Bristol. “It is that race against time – we’ve only just discovered that they make such sounds, and yet we hear the sound disappearing.”“The changes are profound. And they are happening everywhere,” said US soundscape recordist Bernie Krause, who has taken more than 5,000 hours of recordings from seven continents over the past 55 years. He estimates that 70% of his archive is from habitats that no longer exist.Prof Bryan Pijanowski from Purdue University in the US has been listening to natural sounds for 40 years and taken recordings from virtually all of the world’s main types of ecosystems.He said: “The sounds of the past that have been recorded and saved represent the sounds of species that might no longer be here – so that’s all we’ve got. The recordings that many of us have [are] of places that no longer exist, and we don’t even know what those species are. In that sense they are already acoustic fossils.”Burned trees at Lassen Volcanic national park, California, August 2023. More intense wildfires are destroying ecosystems. Photograph: Andri Tambunan/The GuardianNumerous studies are now documenting how natural soundscapes are changing, being disrupted and falling silent. A 2021 study in the journal Nature of 200,000 sites across North America and Europe found “pervasive loss of acoustic diversity and intensity of soundscapes across both continents over the past 25 years, driven by changes in species richness and abundance”. The authors added: “One of the fundamental pathways through which humans engage with nature is in chronic decline with potentially widespread implications for human health and wellbeing.”The shift in ecosystem sound is happening in the air, the forests, the soil, and even under the water. During the cold war, the US navy used underwater surveillance systems to track Soviet submarines – and found they struggled to do so near coral reefs due to all the sounds reefs produced. It wasn’t until 1990 that civilian scientists could listen to this classified data.“Whenever we went to a healthy reef it blew our minds – the cacophony of sounds we heard,” said Simpson, who has been monitoring coral reefs using hydrophones for more than 20 years. “A healthy reef was a carnival of sound.”At the outset of his research, noise pollution from motorboats was his main concern, but 2015 and 2016 brought significant bleaching events, which resulted in 80% mortality of corals. “They cooked the reef,” he said. More than half of the world’s coral reef cover has now been lost since 1950. If global heating reaches 2C, more than 99% of coral reefs are expected to start dying.The result of these bleaching events is a “deathly silence”, said Simpson. “We swam around those reefs crying into our masks.”Mass coral bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef. Photograph: Brett Monroe Garner/Getty Images“These sounds and silences speak back to us like in a mirror,” said Hildegard Westerkamp, a Canadian sound ecologist who has been recording soundscapes for half a century, during which time wildlife populations have experienced average declines of almost 70%.She started working on the World Soundscape Project in 1973 with the intention of documenting disappearing ecosystems. “We proposed to start to listen to the soundscape, to everything, no matter how uncomfortable it may be – how uncomfortable the message.”She said: “The act of listening itself can be both comforting and highly unsettling. But most importantly it tends to connect us to the reality of what we are facing.”Sound data is now being used alongside visual data as a way to monitor conservation efforts and ecosystem health. More sophisticated and cheaper recording equipment – as well as increasing concerns about environmental destruction – are driving the boom in ecoacoustic monitoring.As the sophistication of microphones has increased, scientists are using them to monitor life that would not usually be audible to human ears. Marcus Maeder, an acoustic ecologist and sound artist from Switzerland, has been investigating the noises trees make under stress, pushing a microphone into the bark of a tree to listen to the living tissue. Stress sounds like pulses come from within the cavity, he said.When he first pushed a microphone into the soil of a mountain meadow he discovered it was also alive with noise, “a completely new kingdom of sounds”.Intensively managed agricultural land, often doused with pesticides, sounds very different, Maeder said: “The soil becomes quiet.”Researchers listening to soundscapes in the soil to learn more about its biodiversity. Photograph: Graeme Robertson/The GuardianFor many researchers, disappearing soundscapes are a source of grief as well as of scientific interest. “It’s a sad thing to be doing, but it’s also helping me tell a story about the beauty of nature,” said Pijanowski. “As a scientist I have trouble explaining what biodiversity is, but if I play a recording and say what I’m talking about – these are the voices of this place. We can either work to preserve it or not.“Sound is the most powerful trigger of emotions for humans. Acoustic memories are very strong too. I’m thinking about it as a scientist, but it’s hard not to be emotional.”Find more age of extinction coverage here, and follow biodiversity reporters Phoebe Weston and Patrick Greenfield on X for all the latest news and features

Nature

Forests

Technology

Suggested Viewing

Among Giants

Among Giants begins three years into the McKay tree-sit- a response to Green Diamond Resource Company’s clearcutting of redwood forests. Atop his tiny platform a hundred feet up in the ancient redwood canopy, Farmer must battle the elements and avoid isolation as he fights for a sustainable future. The film uses a restrained verite style that reflects the pace of life in the tree village. As Farmer outlasts a vicious storm, counts the rings on a felled tree, and trumps through a recent clear cut, the film asks questions about what it means to follow one’s beliefs and make a difference in the world.

Forests

Activism

Nature

Reboot

Humans have exploited Earth to the point where it is no longer possible to live on it. Their only option is to relocate to Mars. When the last group of people has boarded the spaceship for the red planet, the Earth can finally breathe easy. Like an expressionist painting, Reboot depicts a world in which the absence of our species is the only chance nature has to recover its lushness and flourish once more.

Animation

Crisis

Cosmos

The Fabricated Wild

The Fabricated Wild explores the intersections between the natural and artificial within the Florida wilderness using personal film-making technology. Images strictly of the natural landscape are sequenced to break from traditional cinematic viewing techniques. Images foreground the natural Florida landscape in the frame and communicate how cinema fabricates the expansive wilderness. The Fabricated Wild frames the complex interaction between a frustrated filmmaker and the collective unconsciousness of the natural environment, a theory outlined by Carl Jung, considering the implications and discoveries along the way. The film frames the experience of interacting with and revealing the forest’s collective unconsciousness that is frequently hidden in cinema to call for an experimental way to engage with the natural landscape. 16mm, Super 8.

Nature

Experimental

Student

Dot

In the not-too-distant future, when depression and loneliness are rampant in modern lifestyles, human limbs have been bent by the extreme use of technological tools, and their field of vision has been limited to the digital screen in front of them. A young man who leads a regular and repetitive life, accidentally notices the beauty of nature and tries to see it again in different ways…

Animation

Technology

Nature