Current Event 2

Earth Science                                                                                       Helen Kocur

Current Event 2                                                                                  12/19/13

                        The Decline and Fall of the Emperor Penguin?

            We know the Emperor penguin to be one of the most iconic and largest seabirds in Antarctica being nearly four feet tall. According to studies led by researchers from WHOI, with global temperatures gradually raising these Emperor penguins in Terre Adelie in East Antarctica may unfortunately disappear.  The cause of this is that the sea ice is slowly melting from warming temperatures in the region due to greenhouse gas emissions, said Stephanie Jenouvrier, a biologist.  Emperor penguins breed and raise there young on the sea ice, so if the ice breaks up and disappears early in the breeding season, it will cause a huge breeding failure.  The disappearing and breaking up of ice can also cause the penguin to obtain less food.  This particular bird feeds on fish, squid, and krill.  These species feed on tiny zooplankton, phytoplankton, and algae that grow on the underside of the ice.  With the ice slowly disappearing, so will the food chain.  Using research to determine how changes in sea ice affect the emperor penguin, Jenouvrier found that the birds would not stop disappearing until 2040.  Today the population size is around 3,000 breeding pairs and roughly 500 to 600 breeding pairs will remain by the year 2100.  The research of these penguins is still being continued with an easier method called tagging.  A Passive Inductive Transponder will be inserted under the skin of the emperor penguins and I will be easier to know if each bird is surviving or not.                 

            This is important because man-made greenhouse gas emissions are causing this problem and in the future not only can penguins be harmed, but other animals living in Antarctica.  If the situation is not brought to attention, people will continue being the cause of global warming which is a result of the ice breakage.   More and more of our animals will start to disappear with a ripple affect on the food chain.  If humans started the problem, it could definitely be stopped in an instant if more were informed.  

            This article was well written and gave me a great sense on how dramatic the disappearance of these emperor penguins really is.  I loved how the author had each paragraph assigned to explain a specific reason on how the disappearance of ice affects the life of these birds.  One thing that I did not like was how the author used one biologist’s opinion instead of multiple.  This would have given me more opinions to think about.  Also, I would have liked if the author would have had a paragraph to explain how we could help and what we could do to save these penguins.       

Works Cited

Levin, David. "The Decline and Fall of the Emperor Penguin?" : Oceanus Magazine. N.p., 21 Nov. 2013. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/feature/the-decline-and-fall-of-the-emperor-penguin>.

The Trouble of Building Where Faults Collide

Gabby Markola                                                                                                                    12/20/13

Earth Science C Block Odd                                                                                            Ms. Davies

Nagourney, Adam. "The Trouble of Building Where Faults Collide." NYTimes.com. The New York Times, 30 Nov. 2013. Web. 14 Dec. 2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/01/us/the-troubles-of-building-where-faults-collide.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1387557725-xabGhdyHty6kX5H8PI6bHg>.

Adam Nagourney’s article entitled “The Troubles of Building Where Faults Collide” describes the problems being encountered by people of California when it comes to buildings.  Architects, business people, and even regular civilians all have something to say about the difficulty of having certain structures in specific parts of California, especially Los Angeles.  A new project, known as the Millennium towers, was proposed to transform Hollywood into a “bustling urban hub,” but many concerns about the faults in that area have prevented the project from beginning construction.  A lawsuit was filed because of how dangerous they are.  This includes the fact that they could fall within 50 feet of a fault line, which violates the earthquake safety law that was put in place in California after the 1971 earthquake in San Fernando Valley that reached a 6.6 on the Richter scale.  While many people argue that it is too dangerous to build any new buildings, many still believe that new buildings should be made.  One of the Millennium developers, Phillip E. Aarons, said that homeowners are just creating “earthquake hysteria” and basing all of their evidence of conjectures.  Mitch O’Farrell, a city council member who voted for the towers, emphasized the point that hall of Los Angeles has fault lines running through it, but that does not mean that all development should be stopped.  He claims that at this point people are waiting for an earthquake that has not even been truly identified.  The Millennium Towers would not be the only buildings to pose a threat to the city; buildings that have been up for many years are also very dangerous.  Studies by the University of California and the Los Angeles Times came to the conclusion that about 1,500 concrete buildings that had been built before the year 1975 are vulnerable to collapse under the force of an earthquake.  Usually heated discussions surrounding the safety of buildings comes right after an earthquake hits, which is why scientists, like Lucile Jones, are impressed with the fact that huge tragedies did not need to occur in order from some thought to be put into the problem.  In terms of the actual building of the Millennium Towers, more research needs to be done before a decision is made.  Many people are asking for more inspections, but that would be very costly for the city.  Although the city of Los Angeles has not come to a final decision about building the Millennium Towers, they seem to be making great headway in this struggle with the faults of their land.

Many times people do not think about the building they are standing in; they do not worry about whether it is going to fall at any second or collapse on them.  People in this society put their faith in architects and builders to make sure that no one gets hurt, but in many cases this is a hard job.  With the added trouble of earthquake faults, their job is almost impossible.  This article displayed the conflicts humans have with the natural world.  Although humans have accomplished many things when dealing with nature, we are still not above it.  We cannot completely protect ourselves from the natural disasters of our world.  We just have to do our best and hope that that is enough to keep everyone safe.  This realization made me choose the article.  It put the world in perspective.  I was more aware of the fact that humans may think they dominate the world, but nature still does what it has to do and we cannot stop it.

The article itself was very informative.  It took the issue of Californian earthquakes, that most people know about, and showed how it really affects the people.  The author showed both sides of the argument and gave many people’s opinions, whether it be an esteemed scientist or a home-owner in the area.  One critique would be the fact that it was constantly jumping around between the two sides of the argument.  Usually, that helps the reader compare as they are reading, but in this case it made it a bit confusing because some of the information was being restated.  Other than that, it was a very interesting article and I am looking forward to finding out what the city of Los Angeles will do with the new Millennium Towers and the old, unstable buildings. 

"Is there a Gay Gene?"

Ally Minoli

            In the presentation, “Is there a Gay Gene,” Nadia Rahman explains there is scientific evidence to prove that there is indeed a gay gene called Xq28. In order to study this gene, scientists looked at the divergence from normal traits. They found 90% of men are attracted to women and vise versa. Over the past few decades, genetic, hormonal, neurobiological, and neurophysiological evidence has come to light. Scientists discovered that this “gay gene” comes from the X chromosome on the mother’s side. There are increased rates of homosexuality if the maternal male relatives are homosexual. Atypical endocrine conditions during the embryonic development can determine the homosexual orientation. Also, homosexual and heterosexual attraction, behavior, and self-identification are more heritable for women than men. Scientists have performed studies on mice, similarly to the study of human diseases using mice. These studies are the polygenic analysis of experimental crosses, which are crosses with mice or rats that allow for genetic dissection of mammalian behavior and complex traits. Basically, Nadia explained that female mice treated with testosterone exhibited male pattern behavior. Scientists found naturally castrated males with an absence of testosterone exhibited female pattern behavior. Ultimately, there are evident biological contributions to human sexual orientation. Also, human sexuality can arise from a number of different contributing factors; some or which are biological and others environmental. However, it is inconclusive of how biological factors and postnatal environmental factors work together to give rise to a homosexual phenotype.

The presentation was very well done. The information was clearly obtainable and presented in a way that was easy to understand. The presenter did an amazing job at explaining all of the harder scientific concepts. Also, the topic was very intriguing.

The symposium was such a neat experience. I enjoyed the mixture of college students and high school students. One poster that caught my eye was “Are you eating a radioactive banana?” It was very mesmerizing, because the friendly college-boy, Brendan, had built a device for testing the radioactivity of an object. His presentation had very complex information, but he explained that bananas are, in fact, radioactive. I was impressed by how well the presenters knew their information. I thoroughly enjoyed the symposium.

Current Event 2: NASA Mars Spacecraft Reveals a More Dynamic Red Planet

Amy Kwok           

Citation:

"NASA Mars Spacecraft Reveals a More Dynamic Red Planet." - NASA Jet Propulsion     Laboratory. 10 Dec. 2013. Web.

Link:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-361&1

Scientists had found dark markings near the equator of Mars, which is probably caused by salty water. That is surprising because they had always believed that the equator was dry. Every year, Mars is changing, so NASA uses the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) to track all the different changes, like craters or storm dust. The markings have been changing seasonally ever since they were reported two years ago. They are usually less than 16 feet wide and extend down the steep, rocky slopes from spring to summer. Then, they would fade in winter, and the cycle would continue. This time however, the slopes had reached over 4,000 feet. They are monitoring five of the sites with the markings in Valles Marineris, the largest canyon system in the solar system, and the information that they got from it was that the markings become visible when the slope faces more sunshine. Alfred McEwen, principal investigator for the MRO, says that it may be because when the temperature rises, the salty water is able to flow down the slope. They were unable to find any water, but they believe that there is salt-water there. It would make sense since dissolved salt is able to suppress the water's freezing point, and the markings can be formed by the water. They also slow down the rate water evaporates, so the salty water flows farther down the slope. Scientists were able to find ice as well from comets and asteroids that hit Mars. They have even been able to spot ice craters down to 39 degrees north, which is more than halfway from the pole to the equator. This tells us that either the average climate is wetter the past thousand years or that the water vapor is more concentrated near the surface than before. Now that the temperature is rising, the ice is slowly disappearing. Robert Haberle of NASA's Ames Research Center said that the dust cycle is the main driver of the climate system. Even with so much more knowledge, the astronomers are mainly asking the question of why dust storms go around Mars in some years and other times, they don’t. Scientists have not found the answer yet, but all scientists worldwide are helping each other find the answers.

This is important because with the new data from Mars, we are able to map out the way Mars looks and the way it behaves. With the evidence of the markings, scientists are able to understand more about Mars, and the idea of salt water on Mars becomes more reasonable. It has been one of the major findings and can come up with idea of salt water on Mars. It can also tell us the climate of Mars right now and how it has been changing over the thousands of years. Mars is better known than ever before and the new sets of data that we have on it is helping us develop other new ideas of Mars. With the data from other orbiters, it has provided additional insight about the dynamics of Mars’ atmosphere and its surface. The data will help future human explorers of Mars know where to find resources such as water, how to prepare for hazards such as dust storms, and where to be extra careful about contamination with Earth microbes. The MRO was just launched in 2005, and yet it had collected so much data already, so they are sure more information and other fascinating parts of Mars will soon be discovered.

The article was really interesting, and I felt like I had learned so many new facts about Mars and the climate of it. It made me think of Mars more as a beauty rather than a dull planet. I thought it was easy enough for me to read and to understand everything. They were able to explain the importance of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter clearly enough that I was able to appreciate it. The one criticism that I have for this article is that I don't think they explained fully about the climate change and how the salt water on Mars had to relate to the ice found near the surface or the dust storm that surrounds Mars' equator. Overall, I think I choose a fascinating article, and I really enjoyed reading it. 

"Legends of the Void"

              While attending the Symposium at Sarah Lawrence College, there was one presentation that was overall very interesting to me. The presentation was called “Legends of the Void,” about how humans took the unknown of space and filled the overwhelming sky with everyday objects in order to make the obscurity seem less frightening. The presenter, Olivia Boisround, explained her fascination with the imagery created in the sky, as well as the legends that corresponded with the images, and created a large canvas painting of the sky, consisting of various constellations and nebulas. Her presentation did more than just explain the organization of the sky, as it is known to be. There were three more layers to the painting and her presentation. Olivia first painted some of the sky as it is commonly viewed, with constellations such as Ursa Major. Then, she changed the constellations in order to make them interact with each other. She used the legends that the existing constellations had been created around and changed them. Olivia was able to incorporate her own imagination into what was preexisting. Next, she added something else to the mythology that has been created long ago. She enhanced her painting by featuring the nebulas and clusters that are known today. She explains how they have always been unknown causing them, in the past, to not hold a place in the mythology of our sky. For example, Olivia combines the image of the Camelopardalis and the Bode’s Galaxy to make it seem as if the giraffe is drinking out of the galaxy, like it is a watering hole. Finally, as her last layer, Olivia took some of the other the already existing constellations and made additional modifications of her own to them. Instead of just making the constellations as is interact with each other, she transformed them into a totally different image, but still following the same mythological story. For example, for the constellation of Orion, the hunter, she changed the constellation into something Orion would have killed while hunting.

             Overall, the presentation done by Olivia Boisround was well put together and very fascinating. She created a large canvas painting of the sky, which grabbed my attention the moment I saw it. Throughout the entire symposium, there was nothing like the presentation done by Olivia. Besides the general interesting appearance of the presentation, the topic chosen was captivating. It was not too technical or complex to understand. Also, the way Olivia explained her topic was easy to follow. She started by explaining why she chose her topic before going into the details of the presentation. If I could give her a suggestion of what she could change to do better next time, I would say that she should include a little more detail of what was actually on her poster into what she actually said aloud because that would have given a clearer understanding to the entire topic.

            As a whole, the Symposium was a very interesting and unique experience. It was exciting to see how the different presentations varied so vastly in topic. The experience was also very educational. Besides just learning about how humans were able to take the unknown sky and make sense out of it, I saw presentations that covered entirely different subjects, such as the age at which children should learn how to read, the effects of sports on children, and a possible bee apocalypse.  All together, the symposium was an enjoyable and educational experience.