September 19, 2011

Good Morning,

The first three articles deal with some really insightful climate investigations, but the last article is the one I want to make special mention of. New technology, to me, is a lot like a new car - it comes with problems. Viruses can ruin computers, phones, tablets and so on costing you a lot of money and headaches. The last article describes some celebrities to avoid due to their tendency to harbor viruses.

Until Next Time,
Erin

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Warming could devastate fish numbers

LA JOLLA, Calif. - World fish stocks could plummet and more than half of some species of fish in the marine food web might die because of global warming, U.S. researchers say. Some of the world's richest fisheries could sustain devastating losses if, as predicted, global warming reduces the amount of oxygen dissolved in some critical areas of the ocean, researchers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif., said. Scripps researcher Tony Koslow analyzed survey records of California waters going back to 1951 and recording water temperature, salinity and the dissolved oxygen content, NewScientist.com reported Thursday.The records were compiled by California to support its sardine industry. "There is almost no other dataset going back so far that includes every kind of fish," Koslow said. Records of 86 fish species showed that the abundance of 27 of them correlated strongly with the amount of oxygen 200 to 400 yards below the ocean surface, and that a 20 per cent drop in oxygen meant a 63 per cent drop in the fish. Climate models predict 20 percent to 40 percent of the oxygen at these depths will disappear during the next century due to warming, Koslow said.


Climate forecasts extended

LOS ANGELES - U.S. researchers say they can make climate forecasts out to 16 months, nearly twice the length of time previously achieved by climate scientists. Atmospheric scientists at UCLA acknowledge their forecasts are much more general than short-term weather forecasts but could be of major importance in fields such as agriculture, industry and the economy. "Certain climate features might be predictable, although not in such detail as the temperature and whether it will rain in Los Angeles on such a day two years from now," Michael Ghil, UCLA professor of climate dynamics, said in a university release. "These are averages over larger areas and longer time spans." Ghil and his colleagues analyzed sea-surface temperatures globally and came up with a new algorithm based on the mathematics of how short-term weather interacts with long-term climate. Weather covers a period of days, while climate covers months and longer, the researches said. They used five decades of climate data to test predictions retrospectively, for example analyzing data from 1950 to 1970 to make "forecasts" for January 1971, February 1971 and beyond, and then checked historical data to see how accurate the predictions were. They reported achieved higher accuracy in their predictions 16 months out than other scientists achieved in predictions of just half that length, they said.


Arctic ice cover hits record low

BREMEN, Germany - Arctic sea ice has hit a record low of 1.65 million square miles and the amount of sea ice cover could go even lower as it's still melting, researchers said. The figure, recorded Sept. 8, broke a previous record for the minimum cover set Sept. 16, 2007, at 10,400 square miles, a release by the University of Bremen's Institute of Physical Analysis reported. The researchers analyzed data from a Japanese sensor on NASA's Aqua satellite, launched in 2002. Satellite records of arctic sea ice go back to 1972, but the Bremen researchers led by Georg Heygster said they believe the new observation is "most probably" the lowest arctic sea ice coverage "since the last climate optimum about 8,000 years ago." The summer extent of the sea ice has retreated 50 per cent since 1972, the researchers said. "Moreover, the sea ice retreat can no more be explained with the natural variability from one year to the next," the researchers said in the release. "Climate models show rather, that the reduction is related to the man-made global warming."


Heidi Klum tops McAfee virus-risk rankings

SAN JOSE, Calif. - A new survey says model Heidi Klum is now the riskiest celebrity to look up on the Internet due to the chances of downloading a computer virus. McAfee said Sunday that Klum replaced Cameron Diaz atop its annual list of "Most Dangerous Celebrities," which ranks the celebrity names most likely to convince Web surfers to click on a malicious spam message. Searching for news or images of Klum carries a 9-percent chance of landing on a site loaded with spyware or some other harmful file, McAfee said in a written statement. The roster also includes familiar names such as Brad Pitt, Jessica Beal or Scarlett Johanssen. New additions include "That 70s Show" actresses Mila Kunis and Katherine Heigl of "Grey's Anatomy." The most notable showing came from CNN host Piers Morgan, who not only broke into the top 10 this year but also placed third, making him the highest-ranked male celebrity.

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