A paper in Accountability in Research last week has stirred up significant controversy among researchers, science journalists and bloggers this week.  Directly from the abstract: “Using Natural Science and Engineering Research Council Canada (NSERC) statistics, we show that the $40,000 (Canadian) cost of preparation for a grant application and rejection by peer review in 2007 exceeded that of giving every…

“We have been replanting forests for 4,000 years, but we are only just now learning how to revive a coral reef.” Mineo Okamoto is a marine biologist at the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology. He’s one of the  researchers leading the charge to restore Japan’s coral reefs, which have suffered a reported 90 percent dieback in the last…

Many trees with large seeds rely on vertebrate seed predators to disperse their seeds. The whitebark pine, a key subalpine species, has coevolved with the Clark’s nutcracker into a tight mutualism.  In their paper in the April Ecological Applications, Shawn McKinney, a post-doc at the University of Montana, and his colleagues studied a natural disruption to this mutualism: an invasive…

Here are some highlights of the most recent Policy News Update, written by ESA’s Policy Analyst, Piper Corp. You can read the full update at ESA’s Policy News page. Details of Waxman-Markey climate bill: On March 31, Representatives Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Ed Markey (D-Ma.) released their draft climate change and energy bill — the “American Clean Energy and Security…

PBS gave a sneak preview of its Frontline documentary, Poisoned Waters, today at the National Press Club. The featured speakers included EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and the founding EPA Administrator, Bill Ruckelshaus, who served under Richard Nixon. Both agreed that to really clean up our nation’s waterways, we need one thing: new legislation. “There is murkiness about the jurisdiction that…

The state governments of Maryland and Virginia, along with the Army Corps of Engineers, announced yesterday that Asian oysters will not be allowed in the Chesapeake bay. The decision capped a five-year study on the nonnative oyster to assess its potential to replace the rapidly diminishing native Eastern oyster, Crassostrea virginica. The decision ultimately came down to the Army Corps…

The Environmental Protection Agency is taking a leaf out of the FBI’s book in their fight against “environmental crimes.” EPA has established a Most Wanted list, including mug shots, of offenders who have been charged with violating environmental laws or regulations. The list was established to put a spotlight on environmental crime and to signal that the agency is taking…

Evolutionary biologists agree that the natural environment shapes the evolution of life. A study published in Nature today, however, finds that the evolution of a species can also have big impacts on the surrounding environment. Threespine stickleback are famous as an example of rapid, adaptive radiation. These small freshwater fish have evolved in the lakes of British Columbia to have…

Members of the House of Representatives have introduced the first federal bill that would attempt to regulate climate change by placing limits on carbon release, ensuring that 25 percent of the nation’s energy comes from renewable sources and reducing the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent by the year 2050. While the Obama administration is weighing whether to use…

To convince naysayers that climate change is real, maybe all we need to tell them is to look up in the sky – or down into the ocean.  Two recent studies show that seabirds can be important sentinels of a changing climate. Says Dee Boersma, University of Washington ecologist and one of the world’s penguin experts, in a NY Times…

This just in: Omega-3 fatty acids are healthy not just for you, but may also be good for the environment. We all read about the beneficial effects of omega-3 fatty acids, found most commonly in fish oils in our diets. They buffer against cancer, reduce the risk of cardiac disease and may also improve brain and immune function.  But in…

The international World Water Week meeting has attempted to raise awareness in developed countries of the growing water sanitation crisis in developing nations. According to the Huffington Post, more than 3 million people are killed each year from water-related diseases, and 98 percent of water-related deaths occur in the developing world. A large part of the world’s water crisis is…