A proposed hydroelectric dam intended to provide “clean” energy in Labrador, Canada may have a more damaging impact on the environment than global warming, owing to a predicted increase in production of the potent neurotoxin methylmercury, according to a new study by researchers from UConn and Harvard University.  http://today.uconn.edu/2015/09/the-human-cost-of-clean-energy/

Read about Molly Hughes’ research experience in the Baumann lab: http://befel.marinesciences.uconn.edu/2015/09/10/lab-news-a-summer-research-experience/

The Mason, Fitzgerald and Morel 1994 titled “The biogeochemical cycling of elemental mercury: Anthropogenic influences”, published in Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 58: 3191-3198  (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0016703794900469) reached a milestone recently of more than 1000 citations. This paper provided a detailed examination of the influence of human activity on the global mercury cycle that is still relevant today. The paper was completed at the end of Rob’s PhD studies in the Department of Marine Sciences under Fitzgerald, and during his post-doc at MIT with Morel. The paper was based on a presentation made at a symposium “Topics in Global Geochemistry” in honor of Clair C. Patterson on 3–4 December 1993 in Pasadena, California, USA.

Professor Penny Vlahos blogs from Sri Lanka during her Fulbright Specialist visit.  Follow her stay at http://srilankafulbright.blogspot.com/.

Tim Bateman ’16 (CLAS) and Maya Thompson ’16 (CLAS) spent five-and-a-half weeks sailing from New Zealand to Tahiti on the Sailing School Vessel (SSV) Robert C. Seamans.  Olivia Robson’16 (CLAS) embarked on the SSV Corwith Cramer.

Read the full article here.

Over the next two centuries, climate change is likely to impact everything from industrial agriculture to the shape of our coastlines.

Read the full article here.

An article by Prof. Visscher and colleagues was recently published in Nature Geosciences.  The group assessed the chemistry and nature of cell-like globules found in 2.72-billion-year-old fossil stromatolites from Western Australia.   The globules were composed of organic carbon and arsenic and their investigation suggests that life existed as a result of arsenic cycling before the Earth’s atmosphere and ocean were oxygenated.   Details about this important finding can be found at:

http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v7/n11/full/ngeo2276.html

University of Connecticut graduate student Zair Burris won the NEERS Dean Award for Best Graduate Student Poster, with her presentation, SPERMATOPHORE PRODUCTION RATES AS A FUNCTION OF FOOD AVAILABILITY IN THE MARINE COPEPOD ACARTIA HUDSONICA, at the meeting of the North Eastern Estuarine Research Federation held at UConn, Oct. 16-17.