New Directions: Enhancing the natural sulfur cycle to slow global warming

New Directions: Enhancing the natural sulfur cycle to slow global warming

The physician's role in efforts to slow global warming.

Dr. Parker’s article in this issue of American Family Physician offers a concise presentation of the science of climate change.1 Global warming will directly affect the health of our patients, communities, and planet; therefore, physicians and other health care professionals have a critical role in addressing the issue. In 2007, greenhouse gas emissions attributable to the production of health ...

Robust Responses of the Hydrological Cycle to Global Warming

Using the climate change experiments generated for the Fourth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, this study examines some aspects of the changes in the hydrological cycle that are robust across the models. These responses include the decrease in convective mass fluxes, the increase in horizontal moisture transport, the associated enhancement of the pattern of evaporati...

Enhancing sleep slow waves with natural stimuli

During wakefulness, neural circuits in the brain undergo plastic changes, mainly in terms of modifications in the strength (or number) of synapses, which underlie learning and memory. The synaptic homeostasis hypothesis suggests that learning-related plastic changes result in a net increase in synaptic strength by the end of a waking day. However, stronger synapses need more energy, space, and ...

Pleistocene sediment offloading and the global sulfur cycle

Quaternary sea level fluctuations have greatly affected the sediment budgets of the continental shelves. Previous studies suggested that this caused a considerable increase in the net loss of shelf sediments. Since sediment accumulation and erosion are closely tied to the formation and re-oxidation of pyrite, we use a high-resolution record of sulfur isotope ratios (S / S) of marine sulfate to ...