[DIALOGnews] DIALOG and DISCCRS News 01/21/2005
Susan Weiler
weilercs at whitman.edu
Fri Jan 21 15:38:32 CST 2005
DIALOG and Disccrs News
01/21/2005
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
RESOURCES
EPA Global Change Research Program
http://es.epa.gov/ncer/rfa/2005/2005_decision_support_sys.html
SCIENCE NEWS
Extinction Tied to Global Warming http://snipurl.com/c6qm
Press Release Summarizing the Full 2003 NSF
Report on Ph.D. Grads.
http://www.nsf.gov/od/lpa/newsroom/pr.cfm?ni=15300000000152
Arctic Rivers Discharge More Freshwater Into
Ocean, Reflecting Changes to Hydrologic Cycle
Caused by Warming
Is wacky weather sign of climate change?
http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=WACKYWEATHER-01-19-05&cat=AN
Nations Debate Climate/Disaster Link http://snipurl.com/c5pu
Fish's Deep-Sea Deception http://snipurl.com/c5p9
FORUM
ASLA 05-03: Political Pundits Offer Advice to Scientists
SUMMER PROGRAMS, COURSES, INTERNSHIPS, MEETINGS
JOBS
University of Nevada, Lecturer in Environmental
Science http://jobs.unr.edu or
www.ag.unr.edu/cabnr/Department_ERS.htm
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Resources
EPA Global Change Research Program
EPA Global Change Research Program has just announced a call for
proposals for research leading to the development of decision support
systems that can incorporate information about the consequences of
global change for human health. We expect a total of $2.7 million to be
available to support this work, and 6 awards are anticipated.
Please see the announcement online at the following address:
http://es.epa.gov/ncer/rfa/2005/2005_decision_support_sys.html
Joel D. Scheraga, Ph.D.
National Program Director
Global Change Research Program
Office of Research and Development
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Phone: (202) 564-3385
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Science News
Check out this section both for news tidbits, and for
examples of how to communicate science to a non-scientist audience
Extinction Tied to Global Warming
from The Washington Post (Registration Required)
via Sigma Xi Science in the News
Scientists call it "the Great Dying," a 250 million-year-old catastrophe
that wiped out 90 percent of ocean species and 70 percent of land species
in the biggest mass extinction in Earth's geologic history.
The cause of this cataclysm is a matter of great dispute among
paleontologists, but research released yesterday offers new evidence that
global warming caused by massive and prolonged
volcanic activity may have been the chief culprit.
Huge amounts of carbon dioxide were released into the air from open
volcanic fissures known to geologists as the "Siberian Traps," researchers
said, triggering a greenhouse effect that warmed the earth and depleted
oxygen from the atmosphere, causing environmental deterioration and finally
collapse.
http://snipurl.com/c6qm
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Press release summarizing the full 2003 NSF Report.
More Science and Engineering Doctoral Degrees Awarded in 2003
NSF Press Release
NSF PR05-009, January 9, 2005
http://www.nsf.gov/od/lpa/newsroom/pr.cfm?ni=15300000000152
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Arctic Rivers Discharge More Freshwater Into
Ocean, Reflecting Changes to Hydrologic Cycle
Caused by Warming
American Geophysical Union
19 January 2005
AGU Release No. 05-02
WASHINGTON -- Far northern rivers are
discharging increasing amounts of freshwater into
the Arctic Ocean, due to intensified
precipitation caused by global warming, say
researchers at the Hadley Centre for Climate
Prediction and Research in the United Kingdom.
Water exchange between the ocean, atmosphere,
and land is called the global hydrological cycle.
As Earth's climate warms, the rate of this
exchange is expected to increase. As part of this
process, high-latitude recipitation and,
consequently, river runoffs are also expected to
increase. This could change the distribution of
water on Earth's surface, with important social
and economic consequences.
It could also alter the balance of the climate
system itself, such as the Atlantic thermohaline
circulation, a kind of conveyor belt. Cold water
flows southward in the Atlantic at great depths
to the tropics, where it warms, rises, and
returns northward near the surface. This flow
helps keep northern Europe at a temperate
climate, whereas the same latitudes in North
America are sparsely settled tundra or taiga.
Researchers Peili Wu, Richard Wood, and Peter
Stott of the Hadley Centre compared observational
data reported in Science in 2002 by Peterson and
others with model simulations, produced by
Hadley, part of the United Kingdom's Met Office.
Writing in the journal Geophysical Research
Letters (21 January), they note that increased
human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are
expected to intensify the Arctic hydrologic
cycle, that is, the cycle of water as it rains
onto land and sea, runs off into rivers, and
evaporates to continue the cycle. The increased
Arctic precipitation is balanced by decreased
precipitation in the tropics, they say.
Wu and his colleagues tested the model with
four simulations that took into account both
human inputs and natural factors, including solar
variability and volcanic eruptions. The results
showed a steady increase in Arctic river
discharges, especially since the 1960s. The
annual rate of increase since 1965 was 8.73 cubic
kilometers [2.31 million gallons] per year, far
greater than the long term trend.
Seeking to determine the source of the upward
trend of recent decades, the researchers asked
first whether it could be the early part of the
predicted increase in the global hydrological
cycle, caused by global warming. Their
simulations excluded human impacts in one
instance and natural impacts in another, and
included all factors in a third. They concluded
that had there been no human inputs, the
hydrological cycle would have shown no trend at
all in the 20th century.
Had there been only human inputs and no
natural ones, Wu and colleagues say, the long
term trend would be 50 percent higher than when
all factors were considered. They conclude that
over the past four decades, human activity played
the major role in increased river flows into the
Arctic. The observed data conform well to the
predictions of the Hadley climate model, they
say, regarding human inputs. They say it is
likely that the upward trend in river
flow changes is part of the early stages of an intensified hydrologic cycle.
The research was funded by the United Kingdom
Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
under the Climate Prediction Program.
Authors: Peili Wu, Richard Wood, Peter Stott,
Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and
Research, Met Office, Exeter, United Kingdom.
Citation: Wu, P., R. Wood, and P. Stott
(2005), Human influences on increasing Arctic
river discharges, Geophys. Res. Lett., 32,
L02703, doi:10.1029/2004GL 021570.
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Is wacky weather sign of climate change?
Scripps Howard News Service - USA
http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=WACKYWEATHER-01-19-05&cat=AN
*****************
Nations Debate Climate/Disaster Link
from Associated Press vi Sigma Xi Science in the News
KOBE, Japan -- The U.S. delegation to a
global conference on disasters wants to purge a
U.N. action plan of its references to climate
change as a potential cause of future natural
calamities.
The U.S. stand reflects the opposition of
U.S. President George W. Bush's administration to
treating global warming as a priority problem.
"It's well known that there's controversy"
about climate change, Mark Lagon, deputy
delegation head, told reporters Wednesday at the
World Conference on Disaster Reduction. "It's our
desire that this controversy not distract this
conference."
The chief U.N. official here had a different view. http://snipurl.com/c5pu
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Fish's Deep-Sea Deception
from Newsday via Sigma Xi Science in the News
In the animal world, permanently pretending
to be something you're not can really pay off.
But to the surprise of researchers, two marine
mimics can go incognito seemingly at will to earn
a mate or a meal.
With its ruse, a cross-dressing giant
Australian cuttlefish can gain access to a
closely guarded female, while the color-changing
bluestriped fangblenny of Indonesia can win a
free meal, according to two studies today in the
journal Nature.
Male cuttlefish need all the help they can
get. Males outnumber females by four to one
during the mating season, leading to some keen
competition. http://snipurl.com/c5p9
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Forum
ASLA 05-03: Political Pundits Offer Advice to Scientists
Author: Gene Bierly, AGU
Sources: AIP's FYI
At a December 2004 seminar sponsored by the
American Association for the Advancement of
Science, former Congressman John Porter (R-IL)
offered advice on how to talk to Congress about
supporting scientific research. Porter, who
chaired the Appropriations Subcommittee that
funds the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is
now a partner in a Washington law firm and is the
chair-elect of Research!America, a lobbying group
for medical research.
Quoting from Porter's speech: ". . . if you
look at this White House and you look at this
Congress, and you want to reach people, yes, you
can talk . . . about the human impact of
scientific advancement. But if you want to talk
about the bottom line, talk about the economy,
talk about the contribution that science and
technology makes to the country and its economic
growth (italics added), that is an argument that
they will listen to. And it seems to me that all
of the science groups ought to get on the same
page, work off the same data, and have the same
message and it ought to be in the forefront of
reaching out to Congress with a message of the
value of science to the American people and to
this economy, to our future. I think it's a
message that resonates. It's true. It's backed up
by evidence. It's strong. And we need to make it
our lead argument with this Congress and this
Administration, because...that's when we're going
to get them to listen."
"You can change the image of things to
come. But, you can't do it wringing your hands
and you can't do it sitting on your fingers.
You've got to get out and get involved and defend
science as you never have defended it before.
Science can, in my judgment, be sold to this
Administration and this Congress. I suggest that
the best way to do that is to recount to them,
over and over again, . . . that the economic
destiny of America lies in science and in
technology, in science and research."
Joining Porter at the seminar was Bob
Palmer, former Minority Staff Director for the
House Science Committee, who noted that on
Capitol Hill science has "...always been sort of
a medium-level priority." He added that his
Republican counterpart on the Science Committee,
David Goldston, finds it miraculous that
"...science gets the funding it does, because it
is politically inactive, it doesn't register on
most people's consciousness, it doesn't reward
candidates or punish candidates. And it does
well because at some level, Members and people in
the Administration understand the importance of
science for the economy and other important
aspects of our lives."
Porter issued a call to action to the
science community: "Will the Administration reach
out to science? We certainly hope so. . . .
Science and technology should not wait on the
Administration to come to us. This Administration
is going to be in office for the next four years.
There is a great deal on the table, including
research funding... Science needs to reach out to
the Administration, to Congress, and try to build
some bridges, and bring the relationship where it
should be."
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Summer Programs, Courses, Internships, Meetings
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Jobs for PhDs
http://www.higheredjobs.com/about/
University of Nevada, Lecturer in Environmental Science
Department of Natural Resources and Environmental
Science, College of Agriculture, Biotechnology
and Natural Resources, University of Nevada, Reno
The University of Nevada, Reno, is seeking
candidates for a full-time (nine-month
appointment) lecturer in the Department of
Natural Resources and Environmental Science, in
the College of Agriculture, Biotechnology and
Natural Resources. This non-tenure faculty member
will be responsible for teaching 9-12 units of
course work per semester, including at least two
sections of ENV 100, our general environmental
science course for non-majors. Minimum
qualifications include a Masterís degree in a
science discipline and/or an environmentally
related discipline. Applicants who demonstrate a
passion for teaching, and have previous teaching
experience at the college level are preferred.
For complete position announcement and
requirements, contact Heidi McConnell, Search
Coordinator, hmc at cabnr.unr.edu , 775-784-4020 or
view at http://jobs.unr.edu or
www.ag.unr.edu/cabnr/Department_ERS.htm.
Applications submitted by January 31, 2005 will receive full consideration
Position start date: July 01, 2005
EEO/AA Women and under-represented groups are encouraged to apply.
Lecturer Search Committee
Attn: Heidi McConnell
Natural Resources & Environmental Science
University of Nevada, Reno MS 186
1000 Valley Road
Reno, NV 89512
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This newsletter has been developed by C. Susan
Weiler to distribute information of potential
interest to recent PhDs engaged in
interdisciplinary aquatic science or
climate-change research, and to build an
international sense of community among recent
grads. It provides an international forum for the
exchange of information and opinions regarding
research, professional and social issues. The
views and opinions expressed do not necessarily
reflect those of the funding agencies or
sponsoring societies. Dr. Weiler reserves the
right to edit or reject material submitted to the
list.
Please submit announcements of interest
to recent PhDs to phd at whitman.edu. Send a short
message in the body of an e-mail message, and
link to any appropriate websites. Do not send
attachments.
Moving? Send address changes to
dialog at whitman.edu or disccrs at whitman.edu
--
C. Susan Weiler, Ph.D.
Office of Earth System Studies Tel: 509-527-5948
Whitman College Fax: 509-527-5961
Walla Walla, WA 99362
weiler at whitman.edu
Programs for Recent PhDs http://aslo.org/phd.html
DIALOG poster http://www.aslo.org/phd/dialogposter.pdf
DISCCRS poster http://www.aslo.org/phd/disccrsposter.pdf
DIALOG VII Symposium Application Deadline May 1, 2005
DISCCRS II Symposium Applicaton Deadline October 2, 2005
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