Transcript

8.14.25 · Science Show KY

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Speaker 1: Welcome to radiowized Diary of Science and Nature. Your reader's
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Kelly Taylor. I have articles related to the topics of
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science and nature, but first a reminder that radioi is
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a reading service intended for people who are blind or
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have other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material.
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We'll start today with an article from BBC Wildlife. Taller
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than a double decker bus or longer than a lorry
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Meet the ten tallest animals on Earth. This from August twelfth.
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Defining tallest gets complicated when you leave dry land. While
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animals like giraffes and elephants are measured by how high
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they stand, marine species such as whales and jellyfish challenge
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the scale with extraordinary body length. This list brings together
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some of the planet's most impressive giants. Whether they tower
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above the tree drops, tree tops, or extend far beneath
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the waves, just be worn. Not all height is vertical.
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The tallest and longest animals include the blue whale. Blue
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whale is the biggest animal ever known to have lived
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on Earth, clocking up to thirty three meters in length
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and matching its length with a whopping one hundred eighty
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thousand kilograms in weight for females and one hundred and
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fifty thousand kilograms for males. Blue whales hold another impressive record,
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with the biggest penis extending up to three meters in length.
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The giraffe standing around four to five meters high. Giraffes
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are the tallest mammals in the world. In fact, some
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giraffes have been recorded at heights of up to five
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point nine meters, taller than a double decker bus. Much
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of this height is found in their long necks, which
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can help them reach high tree branches to feed. The
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saltwater crocodile. The male of this species is around five
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meters in length, although females are significantly smaller, making this
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deadly predator one of the long longest reptiles. Snakes such
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as the reticulated python and green anaconda are longer in length,
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but the saltwater crocodile is generally larger. Historically, saltwater crocodiles
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of up to seven meters in length were likely to
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have existed, but these have been threatened due to hunting practices.
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The lyon's main jellyfish small in body but long and tentacle.
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The land's main jellyfish, can grow up to thirty meters,
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using its long stinging tentacles to capture prey from far
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away and pull it in to eat. It's the biggest
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jellyfish in the world. The Eurasian brown bear Ursus arctose
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arctose is tall when standing on its hind legs. Particularly
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polar bears and brown bears are the biggest of the
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bear species. Polar bears tend to be larger than brown bears,
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but brown bears are more variable in size and can
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reach around three meters when standing on their hind legs.
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The whale shark is the largest species of shark and
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fish on Earth, reaching up to twenty meters in length.
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Despite their vast size, they are gentle giants, not generally
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aggressive towards humans, and considered harmless. They filter seawater to
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feed on plankton. The African element elephant, the heaviest land
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animal on Earth, can grow to between three and four
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meters tall, with males typically larger than females. Their height
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and trunk length allows them to access a wide range
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of food sources. Elephants also have the biggest noses in
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the animal kingdom, at two point seven meters tall. The
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ostrich is the largest flightless bird and the biggest bird
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in the world, weighing as much as a piano. They
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might be flightless, but our stridges are speedy on the ground,
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with running speeds up to forty miles per hour. Is
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partially due to their powerful long legs. The largest extant
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species in the deer family, the moose, is a tall,
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heavy and broad animal with broad antlers. They generally measure
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between one and a half and two meters tall. The
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Indian elephant is one of three species of Asian elephant
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and tends to be between two and three meters tall
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at the shoulder. They're smaller than their African counterparts, but
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still taller than many other land mammals. Now we'll turn
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to The Guardian, and the headline for this article reads,
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Southern Europe swelters under deadly heat wave as temperatures pass
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forward degrees celsius August eleventh, Deadly heat of up to
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forty four degrees sea is setting southern searing Southern Europe,
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as scientists worn of a Molotov cocktail of climate conditions
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that is fueling vast wildfires across the Mediterranean. In Italy,
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where temperatures of forty degrees celsius are expected. In Florence
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later this week, a four year old boy died of
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heatstroke and a red alert warning was issued for seven
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major cities, including Bologna and Florence. The boy had been
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found unconscious in the family's car in Sardinia, was airlifted
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to a Rome hospital several days ago, but died on
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Monday of irreversible brain damage. France's weather placed more than
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half the country under heat wave warnings on Monday morning,
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with twelve out of ninety six administrative units on the
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mainland under the highest red alert, while Spain's Spain has
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warned of extreme danger in Zaragoza and the Basque country,
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as it issued yellow and orange warnings for almost all
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the rest of the country. Both weather agencies forecast temperatures
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above forty degrees celsius over the coming days and called
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for vigilance amid forecasts of a very intense, even exceptional
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heat wave in parts of the continent. Forty degrees celsius,
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by the way, is about one hundred and four degrees
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in fahrenheit. The high temperatures have alarmed experts, as firefighters
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struggled to contain destructive wildfires in France, which brought its
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biggest fire since nineteen forty nine under control on Sunday.
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Authorities reported that one person had died in the blaze,
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while twenty firefighters and five civilians had been injured. In
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the Balkans, Croatian officials praised the superhuman efforts of firefighters
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as they put out a large fire near Split on Monday,
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while Serbian meteorologists warned of extreme conditions for fires to
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develop amid temperatures of up to forty degrees celsius, while
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fires in Albania and Montenegro also forced people to flee
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their homes. According to local media reports. In Spain, fires
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that broke out and Leone and Zamora on Sunday forced
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more than a thousand people to flee their homes, while
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large fires continued to burn in Galicia. Christina Santine Nunio,
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a fire scientist at the Spanish National Research Council, said
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the large number of blazes was to be expected after
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a wet spring that helped plants grow, was followed by
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extreme heat, strong winds in long periods without rain. If
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we add to this the relatively easy possibility that a
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spark can ignite a fire somewhere. We have all the
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ingredients for the Molotov cocktail we're seeing right now, she said.
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French forecasters said heat records were likely to be broken
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on Monday and Tuesday, as temperatures passed forty two degrees sea.
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In the southwest, temperatures hit a record high of forty
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one and a half degrees in the village of Torbes
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near Beziers at the weekend. In Spain, temperatures on Monday
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were expected to rise further and the southern and eastern
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thirds of the Iberian Peninsula and eastern Cantabrian Sea. They
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were forecast to fall In the northwest, the Weather Agency
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said had expected heat of thirty seven to thirty nine
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degrees celsius across the interior of the peninsula on Monday,
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with maximum temperatures above forty and high as it could
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reach above forty four degrees in the lower Guadalaguavie. Haesius
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Santiago Notario, a soil scientist at the University of La Laguna,
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said conditions of extreme and prolonged heat had primed the
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large number of fires across the country by drying out fuel.
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He added, areas in the center northwest to theoretically less
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prone dous of air fires compared with the Mediterranean coast,
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for example, are burning. This is striking to me. The
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world has warmed by about one point four degrees celsius
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because of fossil fuel pollution, which forms a heat trapping
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blanket around the Earth, and the destruction of nature, which
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sucks carbon dioxide from the air. In Europe, which has
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warmed nearly twice as fast as a global average, a
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warm and dry air mass hanging over much of the
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Iberian Peninsula and France is coincided with high levels of
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summer sunshine that have pushed temperatures even higher now. An
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article from USA Today in this one's dated August six,
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smoke from Canada wildfires prompt air quality alerts in the US.
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Large wildfires in Canada continue to cause concerning air quality
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levels across parts of the United States and triggered multiple
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air quality alerts. Over seven hundred and fifty wild burning
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throughout Canada, with more than five hundred labeled out of control.
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According to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Center, Over sixteen
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million acres of land had been scorched by blazes, making
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this year's wildfire season one of Canada's worst on record.
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Smoke from the blazes has crossed into the United States,
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bringing hazy skies to multiple states and major metropolitan areas,
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including New York City. As of August sixth, the Environmental
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Protection Agency labeled air quality throughout the Plains, Midwest, and
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Northeast regions as quote unhealthy for sensitive groups, including the
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city of Chicago. The National Weather Service issued air quality
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alerts in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont,
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New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. The alerts warned those with asthma
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and heart issues to take precautions to avoid fatigue and
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strenuous outdoor activity. Now we'll go to Ours Technica and
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the headline for this article reads experiment will attempt to
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counter climate change by altering ocean. From August the eleventh,
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Later this summer, a fluorescent reddish pink spiral will bloom
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across the Wilkinson Basin in the Gulf of Maine, about
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forty miles northeast of Cape cod Scientists from the Woodshole
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Oceanographic Institution will release the non toxic water tracer dye
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behind their research vessel, where it will unfurl into a
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half mile wide temporary plume bright enough to catch the
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attention of passing boats and even satellites. As it spreads,
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the researchers will track its movement to monitor a tightly controlled,
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federally approved experiment testing whether the ocean can be engineered
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to absorb more carbon and in turn help combat climate crisis.
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As the world struggles to stay below the one and
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a half degree celsius global warming threshold, a goal set
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out in the Paris Agreement to avoid the most severe
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impacts of climate change, experts agree that reducing greenhouse gas
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emissions won't be enough to avoid overshooting this target. The
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latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, published in twenty
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twenty three, emphasizes the urgent need to actively remove carbon
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from the atmosphere. Quote. If we really want to have
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a shot at mitigating the worst effects of climate change,
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carbon removal needs to start scaling to the point where
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it can supplement large scale emissions reductions, said Adam Subhaus. Subhas,
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an associate scientist in marine chemistry and geochemistry at the
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Woods Whole Institution. The test is part of the Lockness
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Project short for locking away ocean carbon in the Northeast
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Shelf and Slope, which subhas has been leading since twenty
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twenty three. The ongoing research initiative is evaluating the effectiveness
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and environmental impact of a marine carbon dioxide removal approach
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called ocean alkalinity enhancement. This method of marine carbon dioxide
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removal involves adding alkaline substances to the ocean to boost
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its natural ability to neutralize acids produced by greenhouse gases.
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It's promising, Subhast said because it has the potential to
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lock away carbon permanently. Quote. Ocean alkalinity enhancement does have
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the potential to reach sort of gigatons per year of
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carbon removal, which is the scale at which you would
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need to supplement emissions reductions. Subhas said. Once the alkalinity
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is dissolved in seawater, it reacts with carbon dioxide in
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forms by carbonate, essentially dissolved baking soda. That by carbonate
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is one of the most stable forms of carbon in
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the ocean, and it can stay locked away for tens
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of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of years quote, but
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it will be a long time before this could happen.
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At the magnitude needed to mitigate climate change. According to
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Will Burns, co director of the Institute for Responsible Carbon
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Removal at American University, between six and ten gigatons of
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carbon need to be removed from the atmosphere annually by
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twenty fifty in order to meet the Paris Agreement climate target.
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It's a titanic task, he said. Most marine carbon dioxide
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removal initiatives, include including those involvingae, are still in a
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nascent stage. Quote. We're really far from ha having any
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of these technologies be mature, said Lisa Eleven, oceanographer and
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professor at scripts Institution of Ocean Oceanography at the University
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of California, San Diego. She was speaking at a panel
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at the United Nations Ocean Conference in June about potential
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environmental risks of mining and carbon diox are removal on
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deep sea ecosystems. We're looking at a decade until any
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serious large scale marine carbon removal is going to be
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able to happen, or more. In the meantime, everybody acknowledges
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that what we have to do is to reduce emissions
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and not rely on taking carbon out of the atmosphere.
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She said, So far, most carbon removal efforts have centered
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on land based strategies, such as planting trees, restoring soils,
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and building machines that capture carbon dioxide directly from the air. Increasingly,
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research are exploring whether the oceans might help. Quote looking
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at the oceans makes a lot of sense when it
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comes to carbon removal because the oceans sequester seventy times
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more CO two than terrestrial sources. Burns said, what if
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it can hold more? That question is drawing growing attention,
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not only from scientists. In recent years, a wave of
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private companies have started pivoting and piloting various methods of
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removing carbon from the oceans. Quote, it's really the private
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sector that's pushing the scaling of this very quickly, Subhas said.
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In the US and Canada, he said, there are at
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least four companies piloting varied ocean alkalinity enhancement techniques. Last year,
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EBB Carbon, a California based startup focused on marine carbon
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dioxide removal, signed a deal with Microsoft to remove up
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to three hundred and fifty thousand metric tons of CO
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two over the next decade using an ocean alkalinity enhancement
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process that splits seawater into acidic and alkaline streams. The
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alkaline stream is then returned to the sea, where it
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reacts with CO two and stores it as bicarbonate, enabling
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the ocean to absorb more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
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In return, Microsoft will purchase carbon removal credits from the startup.
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Another company called Vesta, which has headquarters in San Francisco,
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is using an approach called coastal carbon capture. This involves
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adding finely ground olivine, a naturally occurring olive green colored mineral,
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to sandy beaches. From there, ocean tides and waves carry
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it into the sea. Olivine reacts quickly with seawater in
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a process known as enhanced weathering, increasing the ocean's alkalinity.
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The company piloted one of their projects in Duck, North Carolina,
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last year, where it estimated approximately five thousand metric tons
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of carbon dioxide would be removed through coastal carbon capture
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after accounting for project emissions, according to its website. But
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these efforts are not without risk. We have to proceed
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in an extremely precautionary manner, says Burns. Some scientists are
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concerned that ocean alkalinity experiment. Initiatives that involve olivine, which
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contains heavy metals like nickel and chromium, may harm marine life.
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Another concern is that the olivine could cloud certain ocean
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areas and block light from penetrating to deeper depths. If
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too much alkalinity is introduced too fast, some animals might
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not be able to adjust. Other marine carbon dioxide removal
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projects are using other methods besides OAE. Some involve adding
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iron to the ocean to stimulate growth in microscopic plants
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called phytoplankton, which absorb carbon dioxide through photosynthesis. Others include
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the cultivation of large scale farms of kelp and seaweed,
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which also absorb carbon dioxide through photosynthesis. The marine plants
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can then be sunk in the deep ocean to store
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the carbon they absorbed. One technique that has not yet
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been tried but may be piloted in the future, according
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to a conservation nonprofit Ocean Visions, would employ new technology
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to accelerate the ocean's natural process of transferring surface water
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and carbon to the deep ocean. That's called artificial down
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welling in reverse process, artificial upwelling cooler nutrient rich waters
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from the deep ocean would be pumped to the surface
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to spur phytoplankton growth. So far you see San Diego's
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Levin said she is not concerned or convinced that these
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trials will lead to impactful carbon removal. Quote. I do
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not think the ocean is ever going to be really
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a large part of that solution, she said. However, she
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had it it might be part of the storage solution.
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Right now, people are looking at injecting carbon dioxide as
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removed from industry activities on land and transporting it to
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the ocean and injecting it into basalt. Levin said she's
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also worried that we don't know enough yet about the
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consequences of altering that natural ocean processes. Quote, I'm concerned
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about how many field trials would be required to actually
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understand what would happen, and whether we could truly understand
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the environmental risk of a fully scaled up operation. Most
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marine carbon dioxide removal projects that have kicked off already
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are significantly larger in scale than the Lotness experiment, which
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subhas estimates will remove around fifty tons of CO two.
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But he emphasized the goal of The project is not
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to compete in size or scale, he said. The aim
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is to provide independent academic research that can help guide
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and inform the future of this industry and ensure it
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does not have negative repercussions on the marine environment. And
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now we've got an article from Popular Mechanics in an
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energy breakthrough, scientists just pulled electricity out of thin air.
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This is from August the thirteenth. Inspired after taking a
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hot shower and entering an air conditioned room, engineer Ady
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Suwardi wondered how much energy might exist in the temperature
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difference between his skin and the cool, dry air around him.
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After doing some preliminary research, he was shocked not so
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much that evaporation could be a potential source of energy,
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but that few people had investigated capturing it. As the
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world pushes to electrify, both to stave off the worst
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outcomes of climate change and to feed the increasing electricity
21:59
tons of future technologies, scientists keep looking for new forms
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of renewable energy. Solar and wind are the obvious examples,
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and they remain our best near term bet for kicking
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fossil fuel addiction. Researchers have also tapped into the power
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of the world's oceans, unlocking Earth's geothermal potential, and develop
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nuclear batteries capable of lasting for thousands of years. But
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an unlikely new source of energy might surpass all of these.
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Sowarde and his fellow researchers have now done what once
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seemed impossible, pulling energy literally out of thin air. Scientists
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from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the National
22:40
University of Singapore have designed a tiny device that converts
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the heat from airborne moisture evaporation directly into electricity. They
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detail their methods in a paper published in July twenty
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twenty five in the journal ACS Nano. This isn't a
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wholly new approach. A burgeoning field known as hydro voltaics
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similarly aims to transform moisture into energy. The appeal is obvious.
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Moisture is omnipresent, wind and solar they come and go. Quote.
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Our modern technologies evolved so fast that not every possible
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application aspect has been thought of or demonstrated, says Sowardi,
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a professor in the Electronic Engineering department at Chinese University,
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Hong Kong. Sometimes things are just hidden in plain sight,
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and all it takes is creative applications of technologies that
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we already have. This has led some scientists to consider
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whether large moisture capping capturing machines could help address the
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world's energy needs. In twenty fifteen, researchers from Columbia University
23:49
developed an evaporation engine using the expansion and contraction of
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bacterial spores over a water source, as well as a
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moisture mill that's in quotes that extracted power when wet.
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These methods are still minute power generators, but the researchers
24:08
predicted that perhaps future evaporation engines could yield larger amounts
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of electricity from great power generators floating on large bodies
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of water or large turbine like structures placed above a
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water source. But there's a difference between something being theoretically
24:27
possible and being cost effective against well established renewable sources
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such as wind and solar. Evaporation systems typically convert moisture
24:37
into mechanical energy and then into electricity, but this method
24:42
could be more efficient. Sowartas team found. Their paper details
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a new approach evapo Evapo electrics that's in quotes. Evapo
24:53
electrics cuts out the mechanical middleman instead of transforming moisture
24:58
into energy. Instead, it transforms moisture into energy directly. This
25:04
method generates at least double the amount of energy compared
25:07
to current hydro voltaic systems. According to the authors quote,
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most people don't think of evaporation as a possible source
25:15
of energy, so what he says, But Earth's water energy
25:19
cycle relies on evaporation driven by sunlight, which turns into
25:24
clouds and subsequently rains. So there's a tremendous amount of
25:28
energy involved throughout these processes of evaporation. In a basic sense,
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evaporation takes away an immense amount of heat through vaporization.
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Just one gram of water translates into roughly two thousand,
25:43
two hundred and fifty jewels of heat absorption, enough to
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theoretically power a sixty WHTTE light bulb for thirty eight seconds.
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This new evapoelectric device attempts to miniaturize this process in
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the hopes of powering future wearables and sensors, and that
26:00
future seems possible. As Sowardy and his steam proved they
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could supply energy to a simple lced display using only
26:10
this moisture based method. Their evap electrics device consists of
26:15
a thermo electric generator sandwiched between two heat sinks, components
26:23
designed to draw away excess heat. One of those heat
26:27
sinks is a porous polyvinyl alcohol hydrogel, which soaks up
26:31
water unlets it evaporate naturally. The other heat sink's primary
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job is to maintain a temperature that's close to the
26:39
ambient air temperature. As water evaporates on the PVA hydrogel side,
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it cools the surface, which creates a temperature gradient between
26:50
the heat sinks. As heat flows from one heat sink
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to another, the generator converts it into electricity directly. Sowartie
26:59
says that some applying such a device with continuous water
27:02
for evaporation remains a design challenge. However, even sweat could
27:08
potentially be used as an extra energy source. He says,
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a NonStop, minuscule energy source that can run on sweat
27:17
is perfect for wearable technologies such as smart watches or
27:20
fitness trackers. But there's still a lot that needs to
27:23
happen between now and our possible perspiration powered future. Like photovoltaics,
27:30
hydro voltaics, and evapp electrics are far from one hundred
27:34
percent efficient at converting energy. However, through improvements to the
27:39
PVA hydrogel layer as well as the TEG Swarti believes
27:45
evapp electrics could push into the realm of the technologically practical,
27:50
and as technology improves, it could one day power bigger
27:54
things beyond microsensors. In the near term, Sowardi sees evapp
27:58
electrics as an additional resource for wearables, pulling energy from
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the air and human sweat. Right now, the only limit
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to what's possible is time and attention. Well that's all
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for today's Diary of Science and Nature. Your reader is
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Kelly Taylor, and I'll stay tuned for more programming on
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