Tag - nature

 
 

NATURE

ENVIRONMENT
Aug 6, 2014
'Dead zone' in the Gulf of Mexico is the size of Connecticut: scientists
Scientists say a man-made "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico is as big as the state of Connecticut.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Aug 2, 2014
Toxic gypsy moths — a most unpleasant infestation
Living in the countryside, the usual casual greetings include an observation about the weather, but for the last six weeks around my home in northern Nagano Prefecture, everybody mentioned the caterpillars. Now it's the moths. I've never seen such a plague of them in the 34 years I've been here.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Jul 26, 2014
As species die, what valuable knowledge dies with them?
In mid-June, The New York Times reported that U.S. President Barack Obama intends to use his executive authority to create the world's largest marine protected area in the south-central Pacific.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jul 19, 2014
If chimps inherit their intelligence, does that prove humans do, too?
Some people are smarter than others. And though animal intelligence is far less well studied, it turns out that within a particular population, say of chimpanzees, some animals are smarter than others, too — and these differences are heritable. To put it another way, some chimps' mothers are smarter...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jul 12, 2014
An audience with an island menace
By 8 o'clock on a warm early summer morning on Chichijima, one of Tokyo's Ogasawara Islands, bright sunshine was already threatening to overwhelm my light-sensitive eyes and the heat was cranking up in preparation for what I refer to as reptilian warmth.
Japan Times
Events / Events In Tokyo
Jul 9, 2014
Visit Japan's prehistoric past
It's hard to imagine, but millions of years ago elephants roamed Japan. Although they died out long before civilization, Tokyo's National Museum of Nature and Science can help us imagine these majestic creatures and other prehistoric mammals through a display of Japan-specific fossils. The "Ancient Mammals...
ENVIRONMENT
Jul 8, 2014
Amazon rain forest grew after climate change 2,000 years ago
Swaths of the Amazon may have been grassland until a natural shift to a wetter climate about 2,000 years ago let the rain forests form, according to a study that challenges common belief that the world's biggest tropical forest is far older.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Jul 3, 2014
Nature journal retracts STAP papers, citing 'critical errors'
Science journal Nature officially retracts two stem cell papers published by a team of Japanese and U.S. scientists whose “ground-breaking” work was undermined by errors.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Jun 27, 2014
Tiny shrew has jumbo relatives: DNA study
A new mammal discovered in the remote desert of western Africa resembles a long-nosed mouse in appearance but is more closely related genetically to elephants, a California scientist who helped identify the tiny creature said Thursday.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Jun 19, 2014
Spiders across the world have a taste for fish, scientists say
English poet Mary Howitt's "The Spider and the Fly" doesn't tell the half of it: Spiders of course are happy to devour flies, but their appetites go beyond mere insects.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Jun 14, 2014
Deep underground, water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink
If you want to find Earth's vast reservoirs of water, you may have to look beyond the obvious places like the oceans and polar ice caps.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jun 13, 2014
Severe penalties sought for Riken, Obokata over STAP scandal
A third-party reform panel set up by the government-backed Riken institute has called for severe penalties for stem cell researcher Haruko Obokata and her supervisors, and for the biology center where she works to be disbanded.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jun 7, 2014
Japan's efforts bring back 'extinct' species
Oriental stork 73; crested ibis 82; red-crowned crane 1,143; short-tailed albatross estimated 3,550. Those numbers of wild birds in Japan seem perilously low — and they are, especially when considered alongside the Japanese population of 126.75 million people — but in reality they are good news!
WORLD
Jun 1, 2014
China, India may hinder U.S. steps on warming
U.S. President Barack Obama is set to take his boldest step to halt the rise of the oceans and stop the warming of the planet. But it won't be enough unless the rest of the world follows.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
May 31, 2014
When industry works in step with nature
It was about 15 years ago when an old friend, Yoshito Umezaki, invited me to dinner in Tokyo to meet a friend of his named Masayoshi "Mike" Ushikubo — "a really great guy who loves mountains, travels all over the world and is a company president who has a little problem."

Longform

Sociologist Gracia Liu-Farrer argues that even though immigration doesn't figure into Japan's autobiography, it is more of a self-perception than a reality.
In search of the ‘Japanese dream’