Up to 15% of a potent greenhouse gas in the atmosphere comes from an unlikely source: the guts of tiny aquatic invertebrates. When these creatures feed off of bottom sediments and suspended food particles, they ingest bacteria. The bacteria usually use oxygen to help them break down and process their food, but when they are subjected to oxygen-poor conditions in the invertebrate's belly, they turn to nitrate. The result: nitrous oxide--a greenhouse gas with 310 times the warming effect of CO2. The invertebrates need nitrate-rich waters to spur the process. However, so managing the two big nitrate polluters--fertilizer and sewage runoff--would help to decrease the creatures' emissions, the researchers report online 2 March in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (Photo: Christian Lott (MPI Bremen/HYDRA))

If you register yourself, you won't have to enter these details anymore.
Your IP address is registered (38.107.191.80). On abuse, this will be blocked without warning.

• Archive

• Tiny Amphibian, Long Life
  2010-07-21 16:22:51 - 16 views - 0 reactions
  Credit: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique It may be...
• WorldWide Telescope
  2010-07-13 18:26:24 - 22 views - 0 reactions
  What is WWT? The WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a Web 2.0...
• Paperclip
  2010-07-02 08:18:58 - 30 views - 0 reactions
  By Wulffmorgenthaler.com
• Supersonic Winds Rip Alien World
  2010-06-24 08:20:45 - 32 views - 0 reactions
  Credit: ESO/L. Calcada Hurricane Katrina would be regarded as...
• Mystery of Mars Polar Pinwheel Unraveled
  2010-05-26 22:43:35 - 88 views - 0 reactions
  Something strange has happened to Mars's polar ice cap. Instead...

You should also check:
RuudVisser.com (my brother)
Suzanne (my sister)
PuurElementair.nl (a colleague)