Archaeologists, by definition, uncover the remnants of past human activity. With the first excavation of chimpanzee stone tools at an African site, however, the scope of their work has entered virgin terrain.http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
Chimps transported suitable pieces of stone to the undated site and used them to crack open nuts placed on thick tree roots, according to Julio Mercader of George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
"At least some wild chimpanzees have produced stone [artifacts] and left behind an archaeological record of their nut-cracking behavior," says Mercader, who directed the excavation. He described the recent discoveries at the annual meeting of the Paleoanthropology Society, held last week in Denver.http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
Researchers previously had reported that chimps living in western Africa's Ta� forest avidly stockpile stones at places with broad tree roots or stumps that serve as anvils for cracking nuts. This activity may represent a learned behavior peculiar to the local animals, since chimps living in other parts of Africa don't use stone implements (SN: 6/19/99, p. 388).
Mercader and his coworkers excavated a Ta� forest site called Panda 100. Trees bearing so-called Panda nuts grew in this region until 1996, when they died out. The chimp artifacts haven't been dated yet.
The researchers chose their dig site after noticing four large tree roots that displayed pounding marks made by stones. Excavation of trenches at the site yielded two more tree roots with similar markings. Fragments of nutshells were recovered around all six roots.
Moreover, Mercader's group unearthed 479 stone artifacts, often in close proximity to the shell fragments. These artifacts included the remains of hammering stones, thin flakes that had been pounded off those stones, and pieces of shattered rock.
The earliest known stone tools, made by human ancestors in eastern Africa around 2.6 million years ago, consisted of sharpened chopping implements and larger rocks used as anvils. Chimps' hammering stones recovered at Panda 100 are about the same size as those ancient choppers, Mercader says. However, implements used by human ancestors show more evidence of having been intentionally modified than do those attributed to chimps, he notes.
The Ta� forest discoveries suggest that archaeologists may be able to investigate links between nut-cracking tools employed by chimps and human ancestors, says wild-chimp researcher William McGrew of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Homo species cracked nuts with stone implements at least 780,000 years ago (SN: 2/23/02, p. 117: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/20020223/fob5.asp .).
"There seems to be a signature of chimpanzee archaeology at Panda 100, which is pretty cool," remarks Nicholas Toth of Indiana University in Bloomington, who studies ancient stone tools. Still, he adds, "the Ta� forest material that I've seen looks fairly crude."
In contrast, human ancestors' earliest known tools exhibit remarkably sophisticated workmanship, Toth says. In a study presented at the Paleoanthropology Society meeting, he and his coworkers discerned that 2.6-million-year-old stone tools and present-day stone chopping implements fashioned by experienced tool makers required similar skills.
Toth also notes that two captive bonobos, or pygmy chimpanzees, have learned to make chopping tools out of rocks with considerable proficiency, though not up to human skills. Chimps' tool-making disadvantage largely derives from having large hands that can't manipulate objects as well or generate as much striking force as human hands can, Toth says. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire .
Thursday, December 25, 2008
wild 4.wil.0009 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Archaeologists, by definition, uncover the remnants of past human activity. With the first excavation of chimpanzee stone tools at an African site, however, the scope of their work has entered virgin terrain.http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
Chimps transported suitable pieces of stone to the undated site and used them to crack open nuts placed on thick tree roots, according to Julio Mercader of George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
"At least some wild chimpanzees have produced stone [artifacts] and left behind an archaeological record of their nut-cracking behavior," says Mercader, who directed the excavation. He described the recent discoveries at the annual meeting of the Paleoanthropology Society, held last week in Denver.http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
Researchers previously had reported that chimps living in western Africa's Ta� forest avidly stockpile stones at places with broad tree roots or stumps that serve as anvils for cracking nuts. This activity may represent a learned behavior peculiar to the local animals, since chimps living in other parts of Africa don't use stone implements (SN: 6/19/99, p. 388).
Mercader and his coworkers excavated a Ta� forest site called Panda 100. Trees bearing so-called Panda nuts grew in this region until 1996, when they died out. The chimp artifacts haven't been dated yet.
The researchers chose their dig site after noticing four large tree roots that displayed pounding marks made by stones. Excavation of trenches at the site yielded two more tree roots with similar markings. Fragments of nutshells were recovered around all six roots.
Moreover, Mercader's group unearthed 479 stone artifacts, often in close proximity to the shell fragments. These artifacts included the remains of hammering stones, thin flakes that had been pounded off those stones, and pieces of shattered rock.
The earliest known stone tools, made by human ancestors in eastern Africa around 2.6 million years ago, consisted of sharpened chopping implements and larger rocks used as anvils. Chimps' hammering stones recovered at Panda 100 are about the same size as those ancient choppers, Mercader says. However, implements used by human ancestors show more evidence of having been intentionally modified than do those attributed to chimps, he notes.
The Ta� forest discoveries suggest that archaeologists may be able to investigate links between nut-cracking tools employed by chimps and human ancestors, says wild-chimp researcher William McGrew of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Homo species cracked nuts with stone implements at least 780,000 years ago (SN: 2/23/02, p. 117: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/20020223/fob5.asp .).
"There seems to be a signature of chimpanzee archaeology at Panda 100, which is pretty cool," remarks Nicholas Toth of Indiana University in Bloomington, who studies ancient stone tools. Still, he adds, "the Ta� forest material that I've seen looks fairly crude."
In contrast, human ancestors' earliest known tools exhibit remarkably sophisticated workmanship, Toth says. In a study presented at the Paleoanthropology Society meeting, he and his coworkers discerned that 2.6-million-year-old stone tools and present-day stone chopping implements fashioned by experienced tool makers required similar skills.
Toth also notes that two captive bonobos, or pygmy chimpanzees, have learned to make chopping tools out of rocks with considerable proficiency, though not up to human skills. Chimps' tool-making disadvantage largely derives from having large hands that can't manipulate objects as well or generate as much striking force as human hands can, Toth says. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire .
Chimps transported suitable pieces of stone to the undated site and used them to crack open nuts placed on thick tree roots, according to Julio Mercader of George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
"At least some wild chimpanzees have produced stone [artifacts] and left behind an archaeological record of their nut-cracking behavior," says Mercader, who directed the excavation. He described the recent discoveries at the annual meeting of the Paleoanthropology Society, held last week in Denver.http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
Researchers previously had reported that chimps living in western Africa's Ta� forest avidly stockpile stones at places with broad tree roots or stumps that serve as anvils for cracking nuts. This activity may represent a learned behavior peculiar to the local animals, since chimps living in other parts of Africa don't use stone implements (SN: 6/19/99, p. 388).
Mercader and his coworkers excavated a Ta� forest site called Panda 100. Trees bearing so-called Panda nuts grew in this region until 1996, when they died out. The chimp artifacts haven't been dated yet.
The researchers chose their dig site after noticing four large tree roots that displayed pounding marks made by stones. Excavation of trenches at the site yielded two more tree roots with similar markings. Fragments of nutshells were recovered around all six roots.
Moreover, Mercader's group unearthed 479 stone artifacts, often in close proximity to the shell fragments. These artifacts included the remains of hammering stones, thin flakes that had been pounded off those stones, and pieces of shattered rock.
The earliest known stone tools, made by human ancestors in eastern Africa around 2.6 million years ago, consisted of sharpened chopping implements and larger rocks used as anvils. Chimps' hammering stones recovered at Panda 100 are about the same size as those ancient choppers, Mercader says. However, implements used by human ancestors show more evidence of having been intentionally modified than do those attributed to chimps, he notes.
The Ta� forest discoveries suggest that archaeologists may be able to investigate links between nut-cracking tools employed by chimps and human ancestors, says wild-chimp researcher William McGrew of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Homo species cracked nuts with stone implements at least 780,000 years ago (SN: 2/23/02, p. 117: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/20020223/fob5.asp .).
"There seems to be a signature of chimpanzee archaeology at Panda 100, which is pretty cool," remarks Nicholas Toth of Indiana University in Bloomington, who studies ancient stone tools. Still, he adds, "the Ta� forest material that I've seen looks fairly crude."
In contrast, human ancestors' earliest known tools exhibit remarkably sophisticated workmanship, Toth says. In a study presented at the Paleoanthropology Society meeting, he and his coworkers discerned that 2.6-million-year-old stone tools and present-day stone chopping implements fashioned by experienced tool makers required similar skills.
Toth also notes that two captive bonobos, or pygmy chimpanzees, have learned to make chopping tools out of rocks with considerable proficiency, though not up to human skills. Chimps' tool-making disadvantage largely derives from having large hands that can't manipulate objects as well or generate as much striking force as human hands can, Toth says. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire .
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
squid 4.swqu.00100 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Chalk up another potential victim of global warming. A new study warns that the jumbo squid (also known as the Humboldt squid) may not fare well in the coming decades, as the oceans get warmer and absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, which makes the water more acidic. Jumbo squid blood carries very little oxygen - with each cycle through its body, the oxygen can be used up entirely. This means they must “recharge” constantly, and makes the animals very dependent on what oxygen is available in the water around them. Yet, the warmer water is, the smaller the amount of oxygen it can hold [New Scientist].
What’s more, the squid’s blood cells can carry less oxygen in acidic water. Their blood-oxygen delivery system is highly sensitive to pH, so “the organisms are thought to live chronically ‘on the edge of oxygen limitation,’” the authors wrote. During the day, the squid descend to lower depths in the ocean to rest, slowing down their metabolism to deal with the lower oxygen levels there. At night, they return to well-oxygenated waters nearer the surface to feed [LiveScience]. However, if surface waters are both warmer and more acidic, the squid trying to feed at the surface will get much less oxygen, which will slow down their metabolisms. And lethargic squid are easy targets for predators like sperm whales, researchers say.http://louis0j0sheehan0esquire.wordpress.com
In the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [subscription required], researchers placed the jumbo squid in tanks where the temperature and acidity of the water could be varied. When they subjected them to acidification levels corresponding to possible conditions in the year 2100, they found that the squid’s metabolisms slowed by about 30 percent, and the length of time the squid spent contracting their muscles dropped by almost half, making them move sluggishly in the water.http://louis0j0sheehan0esquire.wordpress.com
If the increasing acidification trend isn’t reversed with swift action to curb greenhouse gas emissions around the world, the jumbo squid may have trouble remaining in their ecological niche, researchers say. “In the future, the habitable window between low oxygen at depth and acidified and warmer waters at the surface will grow narrower,” warns [study coauthor Rui] Rosa. “The net result will be that the squid may become more susceptible to predators, less able to capture prey, or may be forced to migrate elsewhere, altering the oceanic food web”. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
What’s more, the squid’s blood cells can carry less oxygen in acidic water. Their blood-oxygen delivery system is highly sensitive to pH, so “the organisms are thought to live chronically ‘on the edge of oxygen limitation,’” the authors wrote. During the day, the squid descend to lower depths in the ocean to rest, slowing down their metabolism to deal with the lower oxygen levels there. At night, they return to well-oxygenated waters nearer the surface to feed [LiveScience]. However, if surface waters are both warmer and more acidic, the squid trying to feed at the surface will get much less oxygen, which will slow down their metabolisms. And lethargic squid are easy targets for predators like sperm whales, researchers say.http://louis0j0sheehan0esquire.wordpress.com
In the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [subscription required], researchers placed the jumbo squid in tanks where the temperature and acidity of the water could be varied. When they subjected them to acidification levels corresponding to possible conditions in the year 2100, they found that the squid’s metabolisms slowed by about 30 percent, and the length of time the squid spent contracting their muscles dropped by almost half, making them move sluggishly in the water.http://louis0j0sheehan0esquire.wordpress.com
If the increasing acidification trend isn’t reversed with swift action to curb greenhouse gas emissions around the world, the jumbo squid may have trouble remaining in their ecological niche, researchers say. “In the future, the habitable window between low oxygen at depth and acidified and warmer waters at the surface will grow narrower,” warns [study coauthor Rui] Rosa. “The net result will be that the squid may become more susceptible to predators, less able to capture prey, or may be forced to migrate elsewhere, altering the oceanic food web”. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
forest 4.for.9990 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
A sensitive instrument installed in the Canadian Arctic to monitor fallout from modern nuclear tests has detected small amounts of radioactive cesium produced by bomb tests decades ago. The material, which during the Cold War was spread across northern latitudes by high-altitude winds, is still being redistributed far and wide by forest fires, researchers say.
Scientists use a worldwide network of sensors to ensure compliance with the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. While some devices are on the lookout for the telltale seismic vibrations generated by nuclear tests, others sniff the air for radioactive fallout (SN: 7/14/01, p. 25: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20010714/bob11.asp). http://LOUIS2J2SHEEHAN.US
Beginning in May 2003, a sniffer in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories—a device that had been switched on for the first time in January of that year—collected radioactive particles that included cesium-137, says Gerhard Wotawa, a meteorologist with the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization in Vienna. That particular isotope of cesium, which has a half-life of about 30 years, is generated when atoms of uranium-235 and plutonium-239 undergo fission within bombs or nuclear reactors.
The Yellowknife sensor regularly detected cesium-137 until mid-September 2003. In 2004, the radioactive particles showed up sporadically between late June and mid-September. Detectors at two other high-latitude sites—one in Iceland, the other on the remote Norwegian island of Spitsbergen—have detected cesium far less often.
Using computer models and weather reports, Wotawa and his colleagues pinned down the source of the cesium: the fires that typically rage unchecked through the boreal forests of Siberia, Alaska, and northern Canada. The concentrations of cesium measured by the Yellowknife sensor during a given month strongly correlate with the sizes of boreal forest fires then burning upwind, the team reports in the June 28 Geophysical Research Letters.
Air samples taken in previous studies near forest fires have contained cesium-137, says Wotawa, but this is the first time that scientists have detected long-range redistribution of the radioactive isotope.
The researchers aren't sure how the radioactive element makes its way from fallout-tainted soil into the atmosphere. Cesium, a chemical relative of potassium, is readily taken up by plants, so ash derived from wood and leaves could contain traces of the element. Another possibility is that because cesium has a boiling point of 670°C, some of the radioactive atoms may be vaporized from the ground by fires and then condense on airborne ash and soot, says Wotawa. http://Louis1J1Sheehan.us
The cesium-137 lofted during a forest fire is diffusely distributed. "This isn't a health risk, but it's interesting," Wotawa notes. Scientists will have to account for the presence of wildfires when they're interpreting the readings from radiation sniffers, he says.
"[This finding] isn't too surprising, but I hadn't thought of it before," says Mark Fuhrmann, a geochemist at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y. Scientists might use the cesium-137, strontium-90, and other radioactive isotopes in fallout to track nutrient cycles in forests, he notes. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.US
Scientists use a worldwide network of sensors to ensure compliance with the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. While some devices are on the lookout for the telltale seismic vibrations generated by nuclear tests, others sniff the air for radioactive fallout (SN: 7/14/01, p. 25: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20010714/bob11.asp). http://LOUIS2J2SHEEHAN.US
Beginning in May 2003, a sniffer in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories—a device that had been switched on for the first time in January of that year—collected radioactive particles that included cesium-137, says Gerhard Wotawa, a meteorologist with the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization in Vienna. That particular isotope of cesium, which has a half-life of about 30 years, is generated when atoms of uranium-235 and plutonium-239 undergo fission within bombs or nuclear reactors.
The Yellowknife sensor regularly detected cesium-137 until mid-September 2003. In 2004, the radioactive particles showed up sporadically between late June and mid-September. Detectors at two other high-latitude sites—one in Iceland, the other on the remote Norwegian island of Spitsbergen—have detected cesium far less often.
Using computer models and weather reports, Wotawa and his colleagues pinned down the source of the cesium: the fires that typically rage unchecked through the boreal forests of Siberia, Alaska, and northern Canada. The concentrations of cesium measured by the Yellowknife sensor during a given month strongly correlate with the sizes of boreal forest fires then burning upwind, the team reports in the June 28 Geophysical Research Letters.
Air samples taken in previous studies near forest fires have contained cesium-137, says Wotawa, but this is the first time that scientists have detected long-range redistribution of the radioactive isotope.
The researchers aren't sure how the radioactive element makes its way from fallout-tainted soil into the atmosphere. Cesium, a chemical relative of potassium, is readily taken up by plants, so ash derived from wood and leaves could contain traces of the element. Another possibility is that because cesium has a boiling point of 670°C, some of the radioactive atoms may be vaporized from the ground by fires and then condense on airborne ash and soot, says Wotawa. http://Louis1J1Sheehan.us
The cesium-137 lofted during a forest fire is diffusely distributed. "This isn't a health risk, but it's interesting," Wotawa notes. Scientists will have to account for the presence of wildfires when they're interpreting the readings from radiation sniffers, he says.
"[This finding] isn't too surprising, but I hadn't thought of it before," says Mark Fuhrmann, a geochemist at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y. Scientists might use the cesium-137, strontium-90, and other radioactive isotopes in fallout to track nutrient cycles in forests, he notes. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.US
beds 99.bed.11 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Huge tracts of delicate coral gardens and soft-coral forests off the coast of Alaska will be permanently protected from fishing gear that targets groundfish and shellfish by scraping the seafloor. http://louis-j-sheehan-esquire.blog.friendster.com
Most of the affected sites have never been disturbed by this gear. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on June 28 announced its new rule to preserve that situation, which will take effect July 28. The rules don't address nets or long-line fishing practices that don't disturb the sea bottom. http://www.soulcast.com/Louis3J3Sheehan
The largest area to be protected, off the Aleutian Islands, covers 279,000 square nautical miles, an expanse the size of Texas and Colorado combined. Some sites were chosen to protect rockfish habitats. Others protect dense thickets of red tree corals or the unusual communities that have developed around seamounts.
http://www.soulcast.com/Louis3J3Sheehan/
NOAA's new rule is "a big deal," says Elliott A. Norse, president of the Marine Conservation Biology Institute in Bellevue, Wash. Not only does it conserve "a colossal area," he says, but "more importantly, it establishes the principle that bottom trawling is a really severe threat to slow-growing seafloor ecosystems."
Trawling particularly damages deep-sea corals and sponges, he says (SN: 10/26/96, p. 268: http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arch/10_26_96/bob1.htm; 8/7/04, p. 88: http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20040807/bob8.asp). He notes the new rule also establishes that "we shouldn't let trawling expand into new areas." Indeed, he explains, "the pass of a trawl that does the most devastation to fragile seafloor ecosystems is not the hundredth or even the thousandth—it's the first."
Most of the affected sites have never been disturbed by this gear. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on June 28 announced its new rule to preserve that situation, which will take effect July 28. The rules don't address nets or long-line fishing practices that don't disturb the sea bottom. http://www.soulcast.com/Louis3J3Sheehan
The largest area to be protected, off the Aleutian Islands, covers 279,000 square nautical miles, an expanse the size of Texas and Colorado combined. Some sites were chosen to protect rockfish habitats. Others protect dense thickets of red tree corals or the unusual communities that have developed around seamounts.
http://www.soulcast.com/Louis3J3Sheehan/
NOAA's new rule is "a big deal," says Elliott A. Norse, president of the Marine Conservation Biology Institute in Bellevue, Wash. Not only does it conserve "a colossal area," he says, but "more importantly, it establishes the principle that bottom trawling is a really severe threat to slow-growing seafloor ecosystems."
Trawling particularly damages deep-sea corals and sponges, he says (SN: 10/26/96, p. 268: http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arch/10_26_96/bob1.htm; 8/7/04, p. 88: http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20040807/bob8.asp). He notes the new rule also establishes that "we shouldn't let trawling expand into new areas." Indeed, he explains, "the pass of a trawl that does the most devastation to fragile seafloor ecosystems is not the hundredth or even the thousandth—it's the first."
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