Neonictinoids: dangerous to bees and more, with negative consequences for entire ecosystems

Researchers continue to amass evidence showing the harmful effects of neonictinoids in pesticides.  National Geographic's news report for a general audience gives an overview, and many scientific papers are quickly found with a search on neonictinoids in Web of Science.  Here are a few of the most recent, beginning with two articles in the open access journal PLOS One.

Tan, K., Chen, W., Dong, S., Liu, X., Wang, Y., & Nieh, J. C. (2014). Imidacloprid alters foraging and decreases bee avoidance of predators. PLOS One, 9(7), e102725. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0102725

Partial abstract: “Concern is growing over the effects of neonicotinoid pesticides, which can impair honey bee cognition. We provide the first demonstration that sublethal concentrations of imidacloprid can harm honey bee decision-making about danger by significantly increasing the probability of a bee visiting a dangerous food source.”

Sandrock, C., Tanadini, M., Tanadini, L. G., Fauser-Misslin, A., Potts, S. G., & Neumann, P. (2014). Impact of chronic neonicotinoid exposure on honeybee colony performance and queen supersedure. PLOS One, 9(8), e103592. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0103592 

Find it in the library

Chen, M., Tao, L., McLean, J., & Lu, C. (2014). Quantitative analysis of neonicotinoid insecticide residues in foods: Implication for dietary exposures. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 62(26), 6082-6090. doi:10.1021/jf501397m

Godfray, H. C. J., Blacquiere, T., Field, L. M., Hails, R. S., Petrokofsky, G., Potts, S. G., . . . McLean, A. R. (2014). A restatement of the natural science evidence base concerning neonicotinoid insecticides and insect pollinators. Proceedings of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 281(1786), 20140558. doi:10.1098/rspb.2014.0558

Hallmann, C. A., Foppen, R. P. B., van Turnhout, Chris A M, de Kroon, H., & Jongejans, E. (2014). Declines in insectivorous birds are associated with high neonicotinoid concentrations. Nature, 511(7509), 341-+. doi:10.1038/nature13531

Kasiotis, K. M., Anagnostopoulos, C., Anastasiadou, P., & Machera, K. (2014). Pesticide residues in honeybees, honey and bee pollen by LC-MS/MS screening: Reported death incidents in honeybees. Science of the Total Environment, 485, 633-642. doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2014.03.042

Stewart, S. D., Lorenz, G. M., Catchot, A. L., Gore, J., Cook, D., Skinner, J., . . . Barber, J. (2014). Potential exposure of pollinators to neonicotinoid insecticides from the use of insecticide seed treatments in the mid-southern united states. Environmental Science & Technology, 48(16), 9762-9. doi:10.1021/es501657w

Also relevant:  Honeybee Neurobiology and Behavior : A Tribute to Randolf Menzel / edited by C. Giovanni Galizia, Dorothea Eisenhardt, Martin Giurf.  Springer, 2012 online for subscribers.

Pulsar research published by Dan Stinebring

New publication from Stinebring, et al., using the LOw-Frequency ARray (LOFAR) radio telescope, as indexed in Web of Science:

Millisecond pulsar scintillation studies with LOFAR: initial results
Authors:
Archibald, Anne M.; Kondratiev, Vladislav I.; Hessels, Jason W. T.; Stinebring, Daniel R, Francis D Federighi Professor of Physics.

ASTROPHYSICAL JOURNAL LETTERS, 790 (2) AUG 1 2014  [view at IOPScience]

Getting ready for the new year!

Summer is fleeting away, and some of us are trying to squeeze just a little vacation into what is left of August.

Meanwhile, orientation for new faculty has begun and the class of 2018 will be moving in next week.  It's an exciting time of year.  Many of our colleagues around the state have already welcomed incoming and returning students and are in full academic year mode.  By mid-September, these waning days of summer will be a fading memory.  For now, enjoy the relative peace in the science library, where the new book shelves are still brimming with fascinating tomes and a new printer sits gleaming in the copy room, promising reliable performance (hurray!).

Recent Publications by Calcut, Whelan, Wojtal, et al.

Newly indexed publications by science faculty and students, as reported in the Web of Science:

Borromean rays and hyperplanes.

Calcut, Jack S., Assistant Professor of Mathematics; Metcalf-Burton, Jules R. ’15; Richard, Taylor J. ’14; Solus, Liam T.   Journal of Knot Theory and its Ramifications  23 (4) Article 1450020,  April  2014.  Access at World Scientific

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MUC16 (CA125): tumor biomarker to cancer therapy, a work in progress.

Felder, Mildred; Kapur, Arvinder; Gonzalez-Bosquet, Jesus; Horibata, Sachi; Heintz, Joseph; Albrecht, Ralph; Fass, Lucas; Kaur, Justanjyot; Hu, Kevin '11; Shojaei, Hadi; Whelan, Rebecca J., Associate Professor of Chemistry; Patankar, Manish S.   Molecular Cancer 13, Article UNSP 129,  MAY 29 2014.  Access at BioMedCentral.  A "highly accessed" open access article.

---
Microstructures and rheology of a calcite-shale thrust fault.

Wells, Rachel K.; Newman, Julie; Wojtal, Steven, Professor of Geology.  Journal of Structural Geology  65: 69-81, Aug. 2014.  Access at OhioLINK EJC

New Book Shelves are Overflowing!

We have received over 200 new books in the past month - it's a bit overwhelming!  So much wonderful reading for us all.  Come and check out something so we will have room for the next shipment of new books.  Just three are noted here:

Mental biology : the new science of how the brain and mind relate / W.R. Klemm

The oldest living things in the world / Rachel Sussman

Dinosaurs without bones -- dinosaur lives revealed by their trace fossils / Anthony J. Martin

Angiosperms to Dipeptides: publications by Altheimer, Manish, Moore, et al.

Two recent publications by faculty and alumni, as indexed in Web of Science:

Altheimer, Benjamin D. (OC '12), & Mehta, Manish A., Professor of Chemistry (2014). Effects of structural differences on the NMR chemical shifts in isostructural dipeptides. Journal of Physical Chemistry A, 118(14), 2618-2628. [access at ACS, for subscribers]

http://systbiol.org

Drew, B. T., Ruhfel, B. R., Smith, S. A., Moore, Michael J., Associate Professor of Biology; Briggs, B. G., Gitzendanner, M. A., Soltis, P.S., Soltis, D. E. (2014). Another look at the root of the angiosperms reveals a familiar tale. Systematic Biology, 63(3), 368-382. [access at Oxford Journals, for subscribers]  Published by Oxford on behalf of the Society of Systematic Biologists.

Eco Tour app available for download - share it!

Bridget Flynn, OC's Sustainability Coordinator, made the following announcement today:
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Oberlin College's Eco Tour app [for iPhone, iPad or iPod] is now live and available for download on the Apple App Store. This app highlights various sustainability-related places of interest on campus.

The campus sustainability map can also be viewed in a Google map online and will be up on the OES website by the end of this week.

OES student intern Parker Oka-Wong developed the app, with guidance and support from CIT, Communications Office, and others over the past year.
---

Congratulations to the OES team.  Even if you know Oberlin very well, you'll learn something new and interesting and enjoy the images on the app - give it a try!

Keystone & Beyond -- download the ebook, understand the issues.

This information is taken directly from a message from Inside Climate News.  This is important reading/viewing for understanding the complexities surrounding the debate over the Keystone XL pipeline and development of Alberta tar sands.  Free download of this ebook (can be viewed on your computer) is available for just one week.  

"Keystone & Beyond: Tar Sands and the National Interest in the Era of Climate Change traces the Keystone’s origins to energy policy decisions made by President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney in the first months of their administration, and to expectations about energy development that have turned out to be wrong.

"The Keystone has since divided the nation on the fundamental questions of how we should respond to climate change and what our energy future should look like.

"Standing at this crossroads is President Obama who must decide whether or not to approve a project started under his predecessor’s administration. What are the implications for our country and our climate? John H. Cushman, Jr., former reporter for The New York Times, answers this and other questions by constructing a comprehensive and authoritative account of the Keystone saga."

New Publications: Faculty and Students in Chemistry and Geology

Oberlin affiliated authors are indicated in bold:

Journal home page @ ACS

Easterday, Clay C. (OC’11), Dedon, Liv R. (OC’12), Zeller, M., & Oertel, Catherine M., Associate Professor, Chemistry. (2014). Helical (1)(infinity)[Pb2O] chains in polymorphs of Pb2O(C6H5COO)(2). Crystal Growth & Design, 14(4), 2048-2055. [full text at American Chemical Society, subscribers only]

Qiao, X., Schmidt, Amanda H., Assistant Professor, Geology; Tang, Y., Xu, Y., & Zhang, C. (2014). Demonstrating urban pollution using toxic metals of road dust and roadside soil in Chengdu, Southwestern China. Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment, 28(4), 911-919. [full text at Springer, subscribers only]

Exams, Day 1. The place is busy, with an intense quiet.

Day 1 of Exams and the concentration is apparent.  Laptops, headphones, all checked out.  Calculators will be next…

Printers and the stapler are getting a near constant workout.

Best wishes for a successful end to the semester for everyone!

Going to Hell in a hand basket

"We are all going to Hell in a hand basket" was something my grandmother said, and who can blame her?  She lived through two World Wars, the Cold War and two regional wars, plus enormous social change throughout the world. The proverbial hand basket is carried by more than one entity, to be sure, and some are gathering us up in bushel loads and with front-loaders… forget the hand basket.

If you have any doubt, read the latest IPCC report (note - authored by qualified scientists, not political/economic pundits), and consider its implications beyond your immediate vision.  The latest issue of EcoAméricas will also open your eyes and thinking.

Recent Faculty and Alumni Publications in Science

As found in Web of Science, April 18, 2014.  Oberlin affiliated authors are shown in bold lettering:

Katzner, T. E., Daniel S. Jackson (OC '06), J. Ivy, E. A. Bragin, and A. DeWoody. 2014. Variation in offspring sex ratio of a long-lived sexually dimorphic raptor, the Eastern Imperial Eagle Aquila heliaca. Ibis 156:395-403.

Money, E. S., L. E. Barton, Joseph Dawson (OC '12), K. H. Reckhow, and M. R. Wiesner. 2014. Validation and sensitivity of the FINE Bayesian network for forecasting aquatic exposure to nano-silver. Science of the Total Environment 473:685-691.

Owen, J. C., E. A. Cornelius, D. A. Arsnoe, and Mary C. Garvin (Biology). 2013. Leukocyte response to eastern equine Encephalomyelitis virus in a wild passerine bird. Avian Diseases 57:744-749.

Plosone.org: article full-text

Owen, J. C., Mary C. Garvin (Biology), and F. R. Moore. 2014. Elevated testosterone advances onset of migratory restlessness in a nearctic-neotropical landbird. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 68:561-569.

van Vugt, M. K., Patrick Simen (Neuroscience), L. Nystrom, P. Holmes, and J. D. Cohen. 2014. Lateralized readiness potentials reveal properties of a neural mechanism for implementing a decision threshold. PLOS One 9:e90943.

Endocrine Disruptor Week - learn how to avoid the dirty dozen

https://www.facebook.com/ewg.org

Environmental Working Group has declared this to be Endocrine Disruptor Week, in an effort to educate more people about the dangers of toxic chemicals in the environment.  Just posting the announcement has created an interesting spate of comments on the pros and cons of eating soy, fermented or otherwise.  Should be an interesting week on Facebook. 

Background information can be found in any one of these books, all accessible online through OBIS:

• Multi-system endocrine disruption
• Endocrine disruptors and puberty
• Endocrine-disrupting chemicals 
• Endocrine disrupters: hazard testing...
• Toxic bodies: hormone disruptors and the legacy of DES (also available in print in the science library)

Perlik Commons terrazzo gets a make-over. Wow!

Friday morning:
applying the finish, from a reservoir backpack.

At the end of the day, Thursday

Spring break has been quiet in terms of student traffic in and out of the library, but not at all quiet in terms of work being done right outside our door.  The project began Monday, moving all of the furniture from the Perlik Commons.  Intense cleaning and stripping of old wax took at least a dozen people working together, Monday-Thursday, finally resorting to hours of scraping, even on hands and knees with a razor blade, to get the terrazzo stone completely clean.  It's been quite the process to witness.  Today, layers of a protective finish are being applied.  Beautiful result!  Everyone involved should take pride in a job well done - those of us who walk through the Commons on a daily basis will thoroughly enjoy the new look.  Thank you.

We are slow learners when it comes to oil transport

This is very dispiriting news, on the 25th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez spill: Collision and oil spill closes Houston ship channel.

NPR's Morning Edition is presenting in-depth stories on the Exxon Valdez disaster every day this week, so we can better understand the immediate impacts on the natural environment and human communities of Prince William Sound, as well as the enduring legacy of oil in sediment and long-lived species (like us!).  Good listening, thoughtful interviews, rigorous research into all facets of this tragedy.  Remembering the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill series.

Relevant books (print and electronic), government documents, conference proceedings, and Web-based resources abound, for further reading.  Try this keyword search in OBIS: "exxon valdez" or search the subject heading oil spills--cleanup.

"Ripples in the Fabric of Space Time"

Gravitational waves have been detected from the very "first sliver of cosmic time," and are being hailed as the "signature of a universe being wrenched violently apart when it was roughly a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second old." This is the "long sought proof" of the Theory of Inflation, or the Big Bang, and Dennis Overbye of the New York Times does a fine job of explaining it all (March 17, 2014).  Take a look!

We have dozens of books on the big bang, great reading for a bit of background knowledge.  You might like to start with The Big Bang: theory, assumptions and problems / Jason R. O'Connell and Alice L. Hale, editors.  Nova Science Publishers, 2012.

Plastic Bottle Sheds Light Equal to 55 Watt Bulb

Watch this video, from EcoWatch.  Very cool.  Installing water-filled plastic bottles in the metal roofs of some of the poorest homes in the world provides interior lighting where there was none, and creates new possibilities for living and productivity. "This video, shot in the Philippines around the time of the initiative’s launch, shows how the bottles are made and the vast improvement it’s given residents, including some who said they simply slept or always spent their time outside because they couldn’t see inside their own homes."  What a great use of discarded plastic!

Related e-book to check out:  Plastics and sustainability: towards a peaceful coexistence between bio-based and fossil fuel-based plastics / Michael Tolinski.  Wiley, 2012.

The Climate Risks of Natural Gas

From the Union of Concerned Scientists, a new Infographic on the climate risks of natural gas - full of information you can use, now, to help slow the release of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and educate others about the risks of over-reliance on natural gas.

Here's my quick takeaway:
"Can renewables realistically provide more than 80% of U.S. electricity?
Absolutely. A comprehensive study by the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory has demonstrated that currently available renewable technologies could affordably and reliably provide 80 percent of U.S. electricity needs by 2050."

So why aren't we moving faster?  This book addresses that question.  Find it on the new book shelf:
The burning question : we can't burn half the world's oil, coal and gas. So how do we quit?

Having doubts about global warming? Don't. Keep up with climate literacy.

We're getting tired of snow and ice and want the polar vortex to swirl around the north pole where it belongs, thank you very much.  Plenty of individuals with limited "climate literacy" point to the enduring heaps of snow and extended periods of below freezing temperatures and doubt the evidence of a warming planet caused by human activity.  The disruption of typical climate cycles and weather patterns (flood and high-wind warnings today!) increases the urgency that more people understand the complexity and interrelatedness of climatic features.

The library has over 2450 items in the collection with subject headings of Climatic changes or Climate change mitigation.  Where to begin?  Perhaps a quick review for non-specialists, online for free from an independent, scientifically reliable source, is a good starting point.  Two suggestions:

Climate Change: Evidence, Impacts, and Choices.  National Research Council
Climate Literacy: the Essential Principles of Climate science.  U.S. Global Research Program

National Research Council

These reports were distributed at the recent meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and are at the science library reference desk, in print.  Prefer to get your information through a video?  See Climate Change at the National Academies - videos & multimedia.

For up to the minute news stories from around the world, see EcoWatch Climate Change News.  And don't forget the thousands of books and other items found through OBIS.  Far better to rely on those sources of information than so-called climate change "debates" on Fox News or other media outlets with dubious credentials for accurate coverage of scientific topics.

Can you explain color to an 11-year old?

Alan Alda challenged thousands of attendees at the AAAS Annual Meeting to Take the Flame Challenge!  I feel sure someone on campus can do so, in such an engaging and enlightening manner that any 11-year old would be enthralled.

www.flamechallenge.org

This science communication competition, hosted by the Alan Alda Center for Community Science, relies upon nearly 20,000 real kids as judges (and they are not at all shy about pointing out exactly how and why the explanation did not measure up).

Feeling up to the challenge?  Deadline is March 1, 2014.

Recent Faculty Publications (Dec-Jan)

The following publications by science faculty were published December 2013-January 2014.  Online access to each of the articles requires a current subscription.

Calcut Jack S (Mathematics Dept), Gompf RE (2013) Orbit spaces of gradient vector fields. Ergodic Theory and Dynamical Systems 33:1732-1747. [access at OhioLINK EJC]

Demaison J, Csaszar AG, Groner P, Rudolph HD, Craig Norman C (Chemistry Dept) (2013) Semiexperimental equilibrium structures for cis,cis- and trans,trans-1,4-difluorobutadiene by the mixed estimation method and definitive relative energies of the isomers. Journal of Physical Chemistry A 117:13166-13175. [access at ACS pubs]

Gillis KM et al (2014) Primitive layered gabbros from fast-spreading lower oceanic crust. Nature 505:204-+. Co-authored with Andrew Horst (Physics Dept) [access at Nature.com]

Mroue AH, Scheel MA, Szilagyi B, Pfeiffer HP, Boyle M, Hemberger DA, Kidder LE, Lovelace G, Ossokine S, Taylor NW, Zenginoglu A, Buchman LT, Chu T, Foley E, Giesler M, Owen Rob (Physics Dept), Teukolsky SA (2013) Catalog of 174 binary black hole simulations for gravitational wave astronomy. Phys Rev Lett 111:241104. [access at APS]

Page F. Zeb (Geology Dept), Essene EJ, Mukasa SB, Valley JW (2014) A garnet-zircon oxygen isotope record of subduction and exhumation fluids from the franciscan complex, california. J Petrol 55:103-131. [access at Oxford journals]

Scofield John H (Environmental Studies Program) (2013) Efficacy of LEED-certification in reducing energy consumption and greenhouse gas emission for large new york city office buildings. Energy Build 67:517-524. [access at science direct.com]

Walsh James (Mathematics Dept), Widiasih E (2014) A dynamics approach to a low-order climate model. Discrete and Continuous Dynamical Systems-Series B 19:257-279. [access at AIMS]

Keystone XL pipeline: EcoWatch video challenges industry claims

From an EcoWatch video news release: 

"[Yesterday], on the first day of the State Department’s public comment period for the recently released environmental impact report on the Keystone XL pipeline, acclaimed comedians and climate justice advocates team up to release a provocative new video blasting the pipeline’s impact on jobs and the environment."

I haven't watched this yet, myself, but will just as soon as I can without disrupting the intensely quiet environs of the science library.  Here is a bit more about the video:

"Combining environmental justice politics with hilarious satire straight out of the Daily Show, the comedy video, Keystone XL Has a Job for You!, is the brainchild of Movement Generation. Written by and starring Josh Healey and Donte Clark, the video is a comedic twist on one of today’s most serious environmental issues: the Keystone XL pipeline. The Keystone XL and tar sands production threatens people’s health, water and air across North America, especially in indigenous and working class communities and communities of color."

The Center for Biological Diversity is calling for action to encourage Secretary of State Kerry and President Obama to reject the pipeline, citing the likely destruction of at least 20 threatened and endangered species: "Obama's decision comes down to this: Approve Keystone XL and embrace the climate-killing fossil fuels of the past, or reject Keystone in favor of energy policies safer for people, wildlife and a healthy climate."

Yeah! OBIS is back! With a link to different theory of the universe.

OBIS, how we missed you.  Hurray for the online catalog and our entrée to fantastic resources.

Brand new, this online book:  Tree of Nature: the essence of nature is information & communication.  From the Science-Meets-Philosophy Forum of Trans Tech Publications, this will give you something to ponder over Winter Term.

From the concluding commentary by David J. Fisher:

"Fred Wöhlbier’s theory [of the universe] is of an entirely different order and possesses the great virtue of being completely in accord with accepted scientific truths, while requiring no technical knowledge on the part of the reader beyond that needed for the everyday understanding of information technology. Indeed, this is the very message of the book: that the universe is an expression of the tenets of IT." 

CLOSED this morning, due to extreme cold

The college campus is closed this morning.  The Science Library will open at 1pm for our afternoon hours of 1-4:30pm.  The Main Library in Mudd Center is open from 8am-8pm today.  Stay warm!

Winter Term Looks the Part

The onslaught of snow and frigid temperatures has kept traffic into the library at a minimum, but we expect that to change as Winter Term gets a firmer footing on Monday. The storm promised for Sunday may bury these abandoned bicycles completely! Lunching at the picnic tables is just a fond memory for now.

Are Hackers Using Your Laptop Microphone and Speakers? Sneaky.

Disconcerting news just received from the American Institute of Physics (AIP) InsideScience News Service [via insidescience@aip.org]

Computers Can Be Hacked Using High-Frequency Sound

A computer's microphone and speakers can covertly send and receive data.
By: Ker Than, ISNS Contributor
Inside Science News Service  December 11, 2013

(ISNS) -- Using the microphones and speakers that come standard in many of today's laptop computers and mobile devices, hackers can secretly transmit and receive data using high-frequency audio signals that are mostly inaudible to human ears, a new study shows. (continue to full article text)

Everything That Lives Will Die

With these stark words begins a musing on a fundamental fact of life: not every person dies at the same age and there is wild variation in length of life among different species.  A giant fungus in Michigan has been alive since the Ice Age, while a dragonfly lives just four months, and a mayfly perishes within a few hours.  What accounts for these differences?  Read about it in:
The Long and the Short of It: the science of life span and aging / Jonathan Silvertown.

Also on the new book shelf:  Beyond the God Particle, by Nobel Laureate Leon Lederman with Christopher Hill. They write:  "While most scientists expected a vast assortment of new discoveries, new 'super' particles, and bizarre new forces [from work conducted on the European Large Hadron Collider], all we have so far is the single Higgs boson.  The discovery, while important, has resulted in even more questions, the main one being, Who ordered the God Particle, and what is it telling us?"

Fascinating reading in these and other new books just received.

Nelson Mandela's legacy for science and medicine in Africa

Nelson Mandela's influence on human advancement and social development is incalculable in this small space, and millions of people will mourn his death for some time to come.  I will highlight just one achievement that may not be immediately celebrated in the countless remembrances that will be written and shared:  the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology (NM-AIST).

"The Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology (NM-AIST) in Arusha is one in a network of Pan-African Institutes of Science and Technology located across the continent. These institutes, which are the proud brainchild of Nelson Mandela, envision to train and develop the next generation of African scientists and engineers with a view to impacting profoundly on the continent’s development through the application of science, engineering and technology." (NM-AIST About Us)

Our condolences to all who loved President Mandela.  May his legacy inspire all of us and many future generations to live our lives so that others might also thrive.

Stardust and Our Once and Future Planet

December is a month for looking back and looking ahead.  Several new books in today's shipment will help you do just that:  looking very far back, to the beginning of time, as well as considering future possibilities for scientific research.

Here are a few titles to entice you to stop by and gather food for thought, to balance food for feasting in the holiday season.

The Cosmic-Chemical Bond: chemistry from the big bang to planet formation
The Earth as a Cradle for Life: the origin, evolution, and future of the environment
The Stardust Revolution: the new story of our origin in the stars
Time, Space, Stars & Man: the story of the big bang

Don't get so lost in the past that current challenges are overlooked, however!  In particular:

The Science of Crime Scenes
A Piece of the Sun: the search for fusion energy
Groundwater for the 21st Century
Should We Eat Meat?
Our Once and Future Planet: restoring the world in the climate change century.

Is that print copy so important?

I was about to print this notice, perhaps in multiple copies on colored paper in an eye-catching font, to place strategically around the public workstations.  The irony of doing so stopped me.  Hopefully, you also will give careful thought before you use more energy, paper and print supplies.

Reported by the Center for Information Technology, November 25:

"Since the start of the semester on August 27th, Oberlin College has printed 745,885 pages. That's 5.58 trees consumed, 2,022.1 kg of CO2 produced, and 127,319 equivalent bulb hours used."

Presumably, that's just the printing done at public printers, and doesn't take into account the reams of paper used in offices.

Yikes.  It's especially worrisome when we see large number of printouts left behind on the printer.  They couldn't have been that important, eh?

Some lines you've not heard before

Snippets of paragraphs from new books received November 5.  They speak for themselves. Come read!

Over 1000 seals were dying in year as a result of marine debris entanglement [from off-shore fishing practices] in Australian waters.
Fur seals and sea lions.

This minuscule angle would be formed by drawing lines from the top and bottom of Lincoln's eye on a penny in New York and have them come to an apex in Paris. Dreams of other worlds.

The phyla were, after all, born in the sea, and so, if we want to see them, to the sea we must return.  Telling our way to the sea.

There is a full-fledged moral economy of inaction to ensure that our response to climate change and energy scarcity falls short of what is required. The future is not what is used to be.

Need we be paralyzed by the existence of limitations to our ability to gain fully accurate knowledge?  Absolutely not.  The why of things.

Indeed, our self-concept is defined in large measure by how the self fits into not one but many groups of other human beings.  The making of the mind.

Upon stepping out of my tent around midnight for relief from the sauna-like atmosphere, I found the group alive with scorpions... the place was seething with them, with barely room enough to place a foot between the pale, translucent bodies.  Chasing kangaroos.

The sound of dozens of hoofs hitting the road rippled towards us like thunder, and then in a flash the herd burst around the corner.  Consumed: food for a finite planet.

What kind of fundamental theory of particle physics is it that can't predict the masses of its constituent elementary particles?  Farewell to reality.

A Flurry of Publications by Faculty and Students

The following publications were recently indexed in the Web of Knowledge.  Oberlin faculty, staff and students are indicated in bold font.

Getschow C. M., P. Rivers, S. Sterman, D. C. Lumpkin, and K. A. Tarvin. 2013. Does gray squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis) response to heterospecific alarm calls depend on familiarity or acoustic similarity? Ethology 119:983-992. [OhioLINK EJC] also @ Wiley Online Library.

Goderis S., B. M. Simonson, I. McDonald, S. W. Hassler, A. Izmer, J. Belza, H. Terryn, F. Vanhaecke, and P. Claeys. 2013. Ni-rich spinels and platinum group element nuggets condensed from a Late Archaean impact vapour cloud. Earth Planet. Sci. Lett. 376:87-98. [OhioLINK EJC]

Grether, G.F., C. N. Anderson, J. P. Drury, A. N. G. Kirschel, N. Losin, K. Okamoto, K.S. Peiman.  2013.  The evolutionary consequences of interspecific aggression. in
Year in Evolutionary Biology.  Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, vol. 1289 48-68.

Hinckley T. M., P. Chi, K. Hagmann, S. Harrell, A. H. Schmidt, L. Urgenson, and Z. Zeng. 2013. Influence of human pressure on forest resources and productivity at stand and tree scales: The case study of Yunnan pine in SW China. Journal of Mountain Science 10:824-832. [OhioLINK EJC]

MacInnes M., S. Kozimor, K. Boland, and J. Rowsell. 2013. Dithiophosphinates as an approach to the separation of actinides and lanthanides. Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society 245.

Oertel C. M., C. C. Easterday, L. R. Dedon, and M. Zeller. 2013. Chiral inorganic motifs in two polymorphs of hydrothermally synthesized Pb2O(C6H5COO)(2). Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society 245.

Free Access to Elsevier Publications of 2013 Nobel Prize Winners

Scientific publisher Elsevier is providing free access to Elsevier-published research from the 2013 Nobel Laureates in the fields of Medicine, Physics, Chemistry and Economics. Thank you, Elsevier, for granting open access to a significant body of research.  Begin at the Elsevier Nobel tribute page.

elsevier.com

"Elsevier congratulates the 2013 Nobel Laureates and their prominent findings in the fields of Medicine, Physics, Chemistry and Economics. We feel honored to have had the opportunity to work with these remarkable scientists, either through publishing their ground-breaking work in our journals and books or in their role as editors, editorial board members and reviewers. In recognition of these extraordinary scholars, we have made a collection of their work, published with Elsevier, freely available."

Wally the crawler in fizzy Barkley Canyon

Science News, Oct. 19, 2013:  Real time monitoring of the seafloor in six underwater research stations connected to the Internet with fiber optic cables - this is the NEPTUNE observatory (Canada site).  Science News describes an amazingly broad research study of the biological, chemical, physical, geological and acoustical features of the ocean floor, including deployment of a robot named Wally that monitors methane bubbling up from a seafloor canyon more than 850 meters deep.  This issue is on the current reading rack now, adjacent to the circulation desk.  Stop in and read more: the potential for massive tsunamis if too much methane is released all at once, due to warming waters or a change in pressure; video footage of a northern elephant seal slurping up a hagfish in one gulp; seismometer recordings of both whale songs and an earthquake; the vitality and dynamism of ocean ridges.  The NEPTUNE observatory involves scientists around the world and its "online viewing portal" may be accessed by anyone. See Interactive Oceans at Univ. of Washington (NEPTUNE U.S.).

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"mostly our cities are a herp's worst nightmare" - John Marzluff

"This is what we are doing to the animals around us: we are pushing them out, running them over, isolating their populations, changing their sex, modifying their genes, making them mini-toxic waste sites, turning them into freaks, suppressing their immunity, changing their night into day, and stacking the deck in favor of non-native invasives." -- from Urban herpetology / edited by Joseph C. Mitchell, Robin E. Jung Brown, and Breck Bartholomew.  Forward by John M. Marzluff.

Over 100 authors, 40 chapters of research studies across most continents, 13 case studies and countless cited references make this a formidable tome: an urgent plea for conservation and a recognition that biological diversity and reasoned co-existence of humans with other species just as essential for a healthy urban environment as it is for a wilderness preserve.  On the new book shelf.

Eclectic collection in the new book area - thank you, Bruce Simonson

Mysteries of terra firma.

Thanks to donations from professor of geology Bruce Simonson, we have a very interesting array of books in the new book corner.  They represent just a few of the many overflowing boxes of  donated volumes that Bruce has carried into the library over the past several years, and they reflect a wide area of research and general interests.  From deep ocean life to objects in space, from mining astroids to deceitful practices of mining on earth, and solving the riddle of navigation for sea-going vessels (Edmond Halley's doing), these donations expand our collection in new directions. Fun and interesting reading, here!  See the new books list.

Theoretical chemists win Nobel Prize - combining different approaches into a cohesive methodology

The American Institute of Physics' Inside Science [written by Chris Gorski] does a wonderful job of explaining the significance of the work that led three scientists who collaborated in the United States to share in the 2013 Nobel Prize for Chemistry.

"The prize goes jointly to Martin Karplus, 83, from the University of Strasbourg, in France, and Harvard University, Michael Levitt, 66, from Stanford University, and Arieh Warshel, 72, from the University of Southern California, 'for the development of multiscale models for complex chemical systems'."

I also liked Richard Harris' analogy, heard on NPR's Morning Edition, of a "chocolate and peanut butter" combination, to explain how blending quantum mechanics and "ball and stick type models" (i.e., classical mechanics) of chemistry have led to a transformation in our understanding of chemical reactions.

Nobel Prize Week! Great work rewarded, accolades all around.

Yesterday's announcement of the 2013 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine to James E. Rothman, Randy W. Schekman and Thomas C. Südhof "for their discoveries of machinery regulating vesicle traffic, a major transport system in our cells," may have left you wondering what sort of machine is inside your cells.  The Nobel Prize press release explains it quite nicely: "Each cell is a factory that produces and exports molecules. For instance, insulin is manufactured and released into the blood and chemical signals called neurotransmitters are sent from one nerve cell to another. These molecules are transported around the cell in small packages called vesicles."  I especially appreciate the analogy to a busy port, with the challenges of traffic congestion, docking and timing handled by genes encoding specialized proteins and the aid of highly targeted neurotransmitters.  Incredible activity taking place inside us, every nanosecond!  It is worth noting that Schekman, a professor in the department of molecular and cellular medicine at the University of California at Berkeley, is editor in chief of eLife, an open-access, scientist-driven journal founded in 2011. Read more at Chronicle of Higher Education.

The work of the physicists lauded today, François Englert and Peter W. Higgs, is more familiar to the lay reader, given popular media attention to the Higgs boson.  Nobel Prize in Physics press release:  "for the theoretical discovery of a mechanism that contributes to our understanding of the origin of mass of subatomic particles, and which recently was confirmed through the discovery of the predicted fundamental particle, by the ATLAS and CMS experiments at CERN's Large Hadron Collider."  Check out this book for some broader context: The infinity puzzle : quantum field theory and the hunt for an orderly universe / Frank Close.

Peer review - gotta have it, open access or not

John Buhannon, visiting journalist at Harvard and contributing correspondent for Science, conducted a fascinating "sting" operation by submitting a bogus scientific manuscript describing fictional cancer-related research to hundreds of open access journals.  The results were both disturbing and enlightening: more than 150 journals accepted his manuscript for publication, despite significant errors in methodology and data representation that any scientist knowledgable in the field would have spotted within minutes.  Buhannon summarized his findings in an interview with Renee Montagne of NPR this morning.  The implications for lack of peer review are obvious, as is Buhannon's appreciation for open access journals that rejected his manuscript, thanks to effective reviewers and editors at those publications.  Now to help students understand and appreciate that piece of the scholarly communication process, and able to determine the extent of peer review backing any article published online.
Listen to Morning Edition.  Read the paper at Science (an open access article - thanks, Science!).

Beautiful books of Rivers, Mountains, Brains, Plants, People, Rare Creatures... even Art

This week's delivery of new books features so many enchanting volumes, full of lovely photographs with text that elucidates and expands our ways of knowing.

Feeling Beauty: the neuroscience of aesthetic experience, sets the theme. It's the only book we have classified in NX (you'll find nearly all of the NX books in the art library).  It's rather exotic for the science library, with illustrations of both art and music in the center section - how cool is that?

Over the Rivers and Over the Mountains offer gorgeous representations of landscapes with the turn of every page.  The beauty of our world is both stark and sensuous in these volumes; full of lush forested floodplains, jagged peaks, sinuous streams, and steep cliffs.

Rare: portraits of America's endangered species will inspire you to learn more about these finely photographed plants and animals.  From the Delhi Sands flower-loving fly to the largest mammal, it is a book of exquisite beauty and urgency, to live our lives in such a manner that all fellow creatures are also able to thrive.

Many other new books await your viewing pleasure!  Visit the new book corner for some visual delights.  These pictures really are worth thousands of words.  go to: New book list.

Happy Anniversary, Alcoa! Founded Oct 1, 1888

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette reported yesterday that Alcoa kicked off its 125th Anniversary, observing Oct. 1, 1888 as the founding of the Pittsburgh Reduction Company, "after Mr. Hunt and a handful of other steel executives bought the rights to Mr. Hall's patent for a low-cost way to smelt aluminum. Mr. Hall had made the discovery two years earlier."

Charles Martin Hall made that discovery in the woodshed behind his family's home on East College Street, as every Oberlin student should know, with the encouragement and guidance of Oberlin College chemistry professor Frank Fanning Jewett.  Emeritus Professor Norman C. Craig tells an inspiring story of the race to discover what ultimately was called the Hall-Heroult process:

Craig, Norman C., "Charles Martin Hall-the young man, his mentor, and his metal", Journal of Chemical Education (1986), 63(7), 557-9.

Oberlin celebrated Hall's discovery in 2011.  In a private email message today to the Administrative and Professional Staff Council, a retired member of the Alcoa company pointed out that the legacy of C.M. Hall to Oberlin was dependent upon the establishment of the Pittsburgh Reduction Company, which ultimately led to today's Alcoa.  Oberlinians are very grateful for the inventive genius and philanthropy of Charles Martin Hall, and to the industrialization that made his process so successful.

Corals, Holocene Reefs and Energy Conservation: new Oberlin publications

These Oberlin-authored publications were indexed in Web of Knowledge this week (Oberlin affiliated authors indicated in bold font):

Calcification by juvenile corals under heterotrophy and elevated CO2
Drenkard, E. J.; Cohen, A. L.; McCorkle, D. C.; de Putron, S. J.; Starczak, V. R.; Zicht, Alice. E.
 Coral Reefs, 32 (3):727-735; SEP 2013 [view at OhioLINK EJC]
(Alice Zicht '12 graduated with a degree in geology and is now at Rutgers University, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences, New Brunswick, NJ)

Holocene reef building on eastern St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: Lang Bank revisited
Hubbard, Dennis. K.; Gill, I. P.; Burke, R. B.
 Coral Reefs, 32 (3):653-669; SEP 2013 [view at OhioLINK EJC]

Returns to residential energy efficiency and conservation measures: A field experiment
Suter, Jordan F.; Shammin, Md Rumi
 Energy Policy, 59 551-561; AUG 2013 [view at OhioLINK EJC]