Yes, we have bananas!!!! And an amazing banana bread recipe

The scientific name for the genus of the bananas and plantains is Musa, which in many Romantic Languages such as Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian means “muse”.  Isn’t it poetic? While there’s no evidence for a historical connection between the scientific nomenclature for bananas and these fruits’ inspirational nature, I would like to use the coincidence to share this amazing bread recipe with you. It’s...

The World’s Best Mango Salsa

Vegetarians and raw-food enthusiasts, brace yourselves for this recipe! Mango season is almost here and this delicious and easy to prepare mango salsa recipe is guaranteed to make you lick your fingers. But first, let’s review some “Mango Facts”: Very rich in Vitamins C, A and fiber Originated in Southeast Asia or India where it has been grown more than 4,000 years The US is the world’s...

Trippy population predictors

A new series of Atlases created by scientists at the University of Sheffield rescale the world’s land masses according to population growth.  The series of nearly 200 psychedelic maps make for some interesting reading.  I wonder what those geographers are smokin’?  Whatever it is, I think I want some. … The calculation involves some re-spacing so that each individual would have an equal...

The real global water cycle

A new animated film from the Surfrider Foundation highlights the real version of the global water cycle — a little different from the one we all learned in middle school. The film is accessible and very well done, and would make a great teaching aid. It’s about 20 minutes and covers many hydrology basics.  Topics include: Aquifers Salt water intrusion Water policy Desalination Pollution Solutions and...

Richard Alley: Earth’s Biggest Climate Control Knob

Maybe that title is a little misleading… This post is about a speech given by climate scientist Richard Alley.  There is no evidence that Richard Alley himself has any influence on climate, nor would I ever refer to him as a “knob” of any sort. Penn State Cryosphere expert and Two-Mile Time Machine author Richard Alley gave the esteemed “Bjerknes” keynote address at the December...

White roofs to fight global warming?

As part of our new “Journal Club” feature series, we’ll be highlighting a scientific journal article and explaining a major concept in Earth science.  This week we start with a recent publication on white roofs by Oleson, et al., from Geophysical Research Letters: Oleson, K. W., G. B. Bonan, and J. Feddema (2010), Effects of white roofs on urban temperature in a global climate model, Geophys....

The top 50 sustainability books

The prestigious University of Cambridge Programme (translation: ‘Program’) for Sustainability Leadership has released their list of the top 50 books on Sustainability, chosen by their alumni. This is a remarkable resource for anyone interested in catching up on their studies, or formalizing an opinion on today’s environmental issues.  I’m sure it would also be a great help in impressing hot...

Richard Feynman, NASA, and the genius of humor

The Obama administration recently announced that funding will be cut for NASA manned-space exploration projects, including a return trip to the moon in 2020.  Instead, more funding will be directed towards NASA Earth-observation and monitoring missions, in hopes of better understanding our planet and its changing climate.  Thinking back over the history of manned space exploration, NASA has certainly accomplished...

Save the world – pee in the shower

I love that TV show Monk, about an obsessive San Francisco detective who gets all freaked out at the slightest breach of hygiene.  I wonder how he would feel about this new environmental movement? You see, down there in South America a revolution has started.  Its a streaming revolution, led by an army of urinators, taking aim at a single target: conservation. The new campaign in Brazil was designed to teach...

New USGS model on U.S. contamination by toxic pesticide atrazine

A new numerical model by the US Geological Survey gives near real-time distributions of the hormone disrupting crop pesticide, atrazine, in drinking water throughout the United States. Atrazine has been banned in the European Union and several other countries as a result of research showing it disrupts endocrine and hormone levels in animals and potentially humans, affecting reproductive health and sperm...