The humble earthworm provides a new sensitive and detailed picture of what is going on in our contaminated soil ecosystems. New research shows that copper contamination has a detrimental effect by interfering with the energy metabolism of the exposed invertebrates and that different pollutants have unique molecular effects, with implications for both monitoring and remediation of toxins.
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A new study helps explain a cyclic increase and decrease of jellyfish populations, which transformed parts of the Bering Sea — one of the United States’ most productive fisheries — into veritable jellytoriums during the 1990s.
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A new method for assessing environmental contamination after oil spills is in danger of being applied in situations where it doesn’t work and might produce false conclusions.
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Global climate change will not only impact plants and animals but will also affect bacteria, fungi and other microbial populations that perform a myriad of functions important to life on earth. It is not entirely certain what those effects will be, but they could be significant and will probably not be good.
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Ships are inadvertently carrying trillions of stowaways in the water held in their ballast tanks. When the water is pumped out, invasive species could be released into new environments. Disease-causing microbes could also be released, posing a risk to public health, according to an article in Microbiology Today.
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