My Science School

December 2014 turned out to be a horrific end to the year for Sundarbans, the largest contiguous tidal mangrove forest in the world. On the morning of December 9, a tanker carrying furnace oil and a cargo vessel collided in Sundarban’s Shela river, the former sinking and spilling over 3.5 lakh litres of oil into a region popular for its rich biodiversity, including the endangered Irrawaddy dolphin, the Ganges river dolphin and the royal Bengal tiger. Within days, the impact of the toxic oil spill was visible – oil-coated marine creatures (dead or barley surviving) and sharp drop in the diversity of phytoplanktons and zooplanktons, among other signs. Thus, however, would not be the last disaster this region would witness – a ship with fertilizer and two vessels with coal would all sink in the next few years because of shipping bans being withdrawn as quickly as they are imposed.

 

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In November 2014, the U.S. and China (President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping) unveiled a deal to reduce their greenhouse gas output, with China agreeing to cap emissions for the first time and the U.S. committing to deep reductions by 2025. China, the biggest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, agreed to cap its output by 2030 or earlier, if possible. The agreement was seen as being a significant boost to international efforts to reach a global deal on reducing emissions beyond 2020, at a U.N. meeting in Paris the following year.

Administration officials acknowledged that Mr. Obama could face opposition to his plans from a Republican-controlled Congress. While the agreement with China needs no congressional ratification, lawmakers could try to roll back Mr. Obama’s initiatives, undermining the United States’ ability to meet the new reduction targets.

 

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In the last two to three decades, hill-State Uttarakhand in the Himalayan region has seen several natural disasters. However, in June 2013, the disaster-prone area witnessed one of its worst natural disasters in the form of torrential rains and resultant flashfloods, claiming the lives of thousands of people and animals while not-so-quietly altering its landscape. The flashfloods also wiped out settlements and decimated livelihoods. The National Institute of Disaster Management, in one of its first reports in 2015 blamed “climatic conditions combined with haphazard human intervention” for the disaster. Environmentalists point out that adequate steps haven’t been taken to prevent or handle such disasters, including the recurrent Brahmaputra floods that have decimated several regions, especially Assam, over many years now.

 

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REDD+, elaborately known as “Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks” in developing countries, is a programme under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Though the talks began in 2005, the key aspects of this programme were finished by 2013. It is an important part of global steps to control climate change, and seeks to encourage developing countries to contribute to climate change mitigation efforts by “reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) by showing, halting and reversing forest loss and degradation; and increasing removal of GHSs from the earth’s atmosphere through the conservation management and expansion of forests”.

It creates a financial value for the carbon stored in forests by offering incentives for developing countries to reduce emissions from forested lands and invest in low-carbon paths to sustainable development. Developing countries would receive results-based payments for results-based actions. REDD+ goes beyond simply deforestation and forest degradation and includes the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks.

 

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An Arctic record was broken on August 26, 2012 and it was not good news. According to the U.S.-based National Snow and Ice Data Centre, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency, and Norwegian, Danish and other government monitoring organisation that was the day the Arctic sea ice hit its lowest extent ever recorded since the beginning of the satellite record in 1979 – satellites showed it had shrunk to 4.1 million sq.km. The record it broke was 4.3 million sq.km. set in 2007. The heat and the subsequent melting have continued over the years, and 2019 was in line for the second lowest Arctic sea ice extent record.

If the Arctic begins to experience entirely ice-free summers, scientists say, the planet will warm even more, as the dark ocean water absorbs large amounts of solar heating that used to be deflected by the cover of ice. The new findings were published as climate negotiators in Poland are trying to reach a global consensus on how to address climate change.

 

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On June 13, 2012 Australia’s then Environment Minister Tony Burke announced that the country would establish the world’s largest network of marine reserves. About one-third of the island-nation’s waters, running to over three million sq.km of reef and marine life around the country’s border will be covered, he said. While creating 60 reserves and also protecting the Coral Sea, the plan will also restrict fishing and oil and gas exploration, in a major step towards safeguarding the environment.

Highly protected areas such as the Coral Sea off Australia's north-eastern coast and the adjoining World Heritage-listed Great Barrier Reef will also be protected from oil and gas exploration. Both areas, which cover a total 1.3m sq km, have shallow reefs that support tropical ecosystems with sharks, coral, sponges and many fish species.

The numbers of marine reserves off the Australian coast will be increased from 27 to 60.

 

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The earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan on March 11, 2011, turned out to be more than just a natural disaster. It caused a nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Fukushima prefecture, north of Japan. Several reactors at the plant were damaged, raising concerns over radiation leaks. The government set up a 30-km no-fly zone around the facility, and 20 km around the plant were evacuated. Later, the evacuation area was further increased when a spike in levels of radiation was evident in local food and water supplies. Several thousand residents left their homes even as radiation levels remained high months later. About nine years after the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl occurred, the site is cleared of immediate danger, but it still has a lot of clearing up to do.

 

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Established a year earlier under the National Green Tribunal Act 2010, the National Green Tribunal began functioning in July 2011. This specialized body is “equipped with the necessary expertise to handle environmental disputes involving multi-disciplinary issues’ and is guided by principles of natural justice. It has aimed at disposing of causes related to forest, environment, biodiversity, air and water. While the principal bench function s from New Delhi, the zonal benches function from Bhopal, Pune, Kolkata and Chennai. The setting up of the tribunal was seen a huge step towards realizing environmental democracy. Hundreds of appeals/petitions are heard and judgments delivered every year. For instance, over 500 judgments were delivered by the tribunal in 2016, in cases relating to pollution, conservation, industry operations, thermal power plants, mining operations, and environmental compensation, among others.

 

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The United Nations (the U.N.) declared 2010 the International Year of Biodiversity. Throughout the year, several key initiatives were organized to spread awareness on the need to promote biodiversity conversation and encourage everyone – as individuals and groups – worldwide to take mindful steps to stop the loss of biodiversity. That year, the U.N.’s Convention on Biological Diversity held its 10th biannual meeting in Nagoya, Japan. This international legally binding treaty, which came into force in 1993, aims to encourage actions that will lead to a sustainable future.

Biodiversity — the variety of all life forms, from genes up — is vital because diversity makes for healthy, stable ecosystems. From coral reefs to the Kalahari, these natural 'balancing acts' are intrinsically valuable. But beyond beauty and amenity, ecosystems also provide essential 'services' such as breathable air, clean water and fertile soils. Fisheries, agriculture, medicine and many traditions and ways of life all depend on biodiverse ecosystems.

Clearly, biodiversity is key not just to life on Earth, but to economies and cultures. And for the poor, who often depend directly on land and sea for subsistence, it is literally a lifeline.

 

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Also called the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, Deepwater Horizon oil spill is considered to be the largest marine oil spill in history. It occurred on April 20, 2010 when the Deep Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Louisiana, the U.S. The rig was leased by London-based oil company BP. By the time the leak from the exploratory well was capped 87 days later, more than three million barrels of oil had leaked into the waters while the explosion itself had claimed 11 lives. The disaster has had environmental, health and economic impacts.

An estimated 53,000 barrels were flowing into the Gulf of Mexico every day.

The accident also made extensive damages to the marine environment. According to the Centre for Biological Diversity, the oil spill killed over 82,000 birds, 25,900 marine mammals, 6,000 sea turtles and tens of thousands of fish, among others.

 

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Over thousands of years, human beings have found many uses for plants. Some of the most common ones are shown here.

Plants also provide us with fibres for making cloth, rope, paper etc. There are numerous dyes obtained from plants with which to colour our fabrics. Many plants have oil-rich seeds and these oils can be extracted when they have a variety of uses. Many of them are edible and they can also be used as lubricants, fuel, for lighting, in paints and varnishes, as a wood preservative, waterproofing etc.

The articles below highlight some of these uses.

• Alternative Lighting: Plant Oils Waxes


• Fibre Plants


• Soap Plants


• Vegetable Oil

Building Materials

• Insulation: Providing insulation against extremes of temperature, sound or electricity.


• Pipes: For carrying water etc.


• Pitch: Used for waterproofing, in paints etc.


• Plaster: Used for covering walls.


• Roofing: Used to give a waterproof roof to buildings. See also Thatching.


• Thatching Used for making thatched roofs.

Clothing

 

• Buttons: Plants that can be used as buttons. Not including making buttons from wood.


• Darning ball 


• Fibre: Used for making cloth, rope, paper etc.


• Latex: A source of rubber.


• Leather: Substitutes, that is.


• Needles: Used for sewing, darning etc.


• Pins: Used as needles and pins in sewing etc. Also used to lance boils, extract splinters from the skin etc.


• Raffia: A substitute for that material.


• Starch: Used as a fabric stiffener.


• Stuffing: Used in making soft toys, mattresses, pillows etc.


• Tannin: An astringent substance obtained from plants, it is used medicinally, as a dye and mordant, stabilizer in pesticide etc.


• Weaving: Items such as grass and palm leaves that are woven together for making mats, baskets etc. See also Basket making and Fibre.

Dyes, paints, inks and paper

• Blotting paper: Plant that can be used to make blotting paper.


• Dye: Plants that provide dyes.


• Ink: Plants that can be used as an ink.


• Mordant: Used for making a dye more permanent, it also affects the colour of the dye.


• Paint: Plants used directly as paint. Does not include oil plants and dyes that can be used as ingredients in paints.


• Paper: Related to the entry for Fibre, these plants have been specifically mentioned for paper making.


• Pencil: A couple of plants especially mentioned for making the tubes that pencil leads fit into.


• Size: Used on materials, paper etc to give a surface that will take ink, dyes etc. 

A Plant’s leaves contain a green substance called chlorophyll. The chlorophyll energy enables chemical reactions to take place. These use energy from the Sun and carbon dioxide gas from the air to make food for the plant to live and grow. As photosynthesis happens, oxygen is given off into the air.

Green plants use photosynthesis to create energy from carbon dioxide and sunlight. This energy, in the form of glucose, is used by the plant to grow and fuel the necessary reproductive activities of the plant. Excess glucose is stored in the leaves, stem and roots of the plant. The stored glucose provides food for higher organisms that eat the plants. A byproduct of the process of photosynthesis is oxygen, which is released into the atmosphere in exchange for the carbon dioxide used during the chemical reaction of photosynthesis.

Photosynthesis in plants requires a combination of carbon dioxide, water and light energy. The light energy used in photosynthesis is typically derived from the sun but is also effective when provided by artificial lighting. The leaves of a plant have the primary burden of creating food for the plant through the process of photosynthesis. The leaves of a plant are spread flat to catch as many of the sun's rays as possible, in order to facilitate the absorption of light energy.

Within the leaves are mesophyll cells which contain chloroplasts. Photosynthesis occurs within these structures, which contain the substance chlorophyll. Chlorophyll, along with other pigments present in the chloroplast, absorbs the light energy of all colors but green for use in the photosynthesis process. The remaining green light is reflected back off of the plant, resulting in green color characteristic of a plant using photosynthesis for energy. Once the light has been absorbed, it must be stored as ATP, or adenosine triphosphate, in order to be used in the next phase of photosynthesis.

During the final stage of photosynthesis, which is considered to be light-independent, carbon dioxide is converted into glucose. This chemical change requires the ATP that was stored in the first part of the photosynthesis cycle. The ATP is combined with carbon dioxide in what is known as the Calvin cycle. This combination creates a compound called glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate, which combines with another glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate compound as it is produced, to produce one glucose molecule.

Like animals, plants need food for energy to survive and grow, but while animals can move about to catch their food or find new areas of vegetation, plants are usually rooted to one spot. But plants can do something that no animal can do. They can make energy from sunlight. This process is called photosynthesis. As well as light, plants also need water and nutrients.

          A plant may not look lively and active. But inside its millions of microscopic cells, thousands of chemical changes take place as part of the plant’s life processes. Like an animal’s body, a plant’s body has many specialized parts for different jobs. The roots take in water, minerals, salts and other substances from the soil in which the plant grows. The stiff stem holds the main parts of the plant above the surface, away from animals on the ground that might eat it, and above other plants so that the leaves can catch more sunlight. 

          A plant’s leaves are “light-powered food factories”. They are broad and flat so that as much light as possible falls on them. A green substance called chlorophyll in the leaves catches or absorbs the energy in light. It uses this energy to make a chemical reaction. Water, taken up from the soil, and carbon dioxide, taken in from the air, join together to form sugar, which contains lots of energy in chemical form. The plant then uses the sugar to power its life activities. The process is called photosynthesis —a word meaning “making with light”.

          The carbon dioxide for photosynthesis comes from the air. It seeps into the leaf through tiny holes in its lower surface, known as stomata. In addition to sugar, photosynthesis also produces oxygen, which seeps out into the air. Living things including ourselves need oxygen to survive. Plants help to top up its level in the air.

The system of classifying living things was invented by a Swedish botanist called Carolos Linnaeus (1707-78). Latin was traditionally the language used by scholars, so the classifications have Latin names. This also means that living things can be identified by scientists in every country, no matter what the local name for a species might be.

Most plants and animals have popular names that can vary from place to place. So a name needed to be given that would be recognized everywhere. It was decided so use Latin for the scientific names, as it was the language use centuries ago by learned people. Carl Linnaeus was the man who established the modern scientific method for naming plants and animals. Scientific names are in two parts. The first part is the generic name, which describes a group of related living things. The second name is the specific name, which applies only to that living thing. This specific name may describe the living thing, or it could include the name of the person who discovered it.

Linnaeus and other scientists used Latin because it was a dead language. No people or nation uses it as an official language. Many other languages may have Latin bases but don't use all of it. So he would not insult any country when he began to name organisms although you will see that he did one time to a person he did not like. Before Linnaeus, species naming practices varied. He did study to be a doctor of medicine but was attracted to botany as many medicines at the time were from plants.

Many biologists gave the species they described long, unwieldy Latin names, which could be altered at will; a scientist comparing two descriptions of species might not be able to tell which organisms were being referred to. For instance, the common wild briar rose was referred to by different botanists as Rosa sylvestris inodora seu canina and as Rosa sylvestris alba cum rubore, folio glabro. The need for a workable naming system was made even greater by the huge number of plants and animals that were being brought back to Europe from Asia, Africa, and the Americas.

After experimenting with various alternatives, Linnaeus simplified naming immensely by designating one Latin name to indicate the genus, and one as a "shorthand" name for the species. The two names make up the binomial ("two names") species name. The sexual basis of Linnaeus's plant classification was controversial in its day; although easy to learn and use, it clearly did not give good results in many cases.

Some critics also attacked it for its sexually explicit nature: one opponent, botanist Johann Siegesbeck, called it "loathsome harlotry". (Linnaeus had his revenge, however; he named a small, useless European weed Siegesbeckia.)

The class of insects is the largest class of living things, containing over one million different species.

In terms of numbers of species, insects certainly represent the largest percentage of the world's organisms. There are more than 1 million species of insects that have been documented and studied by scientists. And the total number of documented species of living organisms at the present time is probably about 2.5 million. So insects represent about 40% of all known living species!

But that's not the end of the story. Scientists estimate that there may actually be somewhere between 10 and 30 million species of insects inhabiting our planet. So insects as a percentage of organisms might actually be greater than we currently estimate.

If we look at your question from the point of view of numbers of individuals, the answers is almost certainly insects as well. In fact, the answer may be ants. There are 14,000 known species of ants. And they all form ant colonies. In some species of ants, those colonies may be extremely large. One colony may contain many tens of thousands of individuals! Some scientists have made credible calculations suggesting that the weight of all ants is greater than that of all humans.