Tuesday, June 16, 2026

Ecosystems

ClimateEcosystems
Andrea Valcarcel

Prickly Adaptability: Will Crown-of-Thorn Starfish Populations Survive Rising Ocean Temperature and Acidity?

Crown-of-Thorns starfish outbreaks are of growing concern for the wellbeing of Indo-Pacific coral reefs. When these starfish populations grow too quickly, they feed on corals at rates that don’t allow the ecosystem to recover fast enough. With coral reefs struggling to survive rising ocean temperatures and acidity, it is essential to determine how these conditions affect their predators – in this case, the Crown-of-Thorn starfish. A recent study found that ocean warming and acidification affect larval development but not survivability. Could this mean bad news for coral reefs?

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Case StudiesEcosystemsEnvironmental ScienceRemediation
Brianne Palmer

Radioactive exclusion zone or restoration at work? Insights from the re-wilding of Chernobyl

In 1986 a nuclear disaster rocked Belarus and forced thousands of people to abandon their homes for fear of radiation exposure. Now, removed from the impacts of human settlements, wildlife are returning to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (CEZ). In a new study, researchers studied the raptors in the CEZ to test re-wilding and ask the question: can removing humans from a landscape help restore the natural environments? And like all things in ecology, the answer is more complicated than it seems but offers a glimmer of hope for re-wilding endeavors in this Decade on Ecological Restoration.

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Animal behaviorCase StudiesEcosystemsEnvironmental Science
Sam Schurkamp

For elk reintroduced in the Missouri Ozarks, love is in the air

Habitat loss and overhunting decimated local elk populations in the 1800s. Now, researchers are finding new ways to return them to their native land.

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Ecosystems
Etienne Herrick

The secret’s in the soil: Can soil organic matter protect crops from drought?

Global climate change means that droughts are becoming more frequent and intense in many agricultural areas. Recent evidence suggests that the secret to protecting crops against drought may lie beneath our feet – read on to learn more about how farmers can manage their soil as a way to help protect their crops against droughts!

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Close-up image of a honey bee sitting on a green leaf
Animal behaviorCitiesEcosystemsEnvironmental Science
Jenna Zukswert

Decoding the Waggle Dance: The Importance of Flowers in Urban Landscapes for Honey Bees

Bee populations are threatened due to habitat loss and fragmentation, partly due to the expansion and intensification of agriculture worldwide. By videotaping and analyzing the “waggle dances” of honey bees near London, scientists compared the distance that bees need to travel to reach nectar in urban and agricultural landscapes. Bees needed to travel less far to reach nectar and pollen in urban areas vs. agricultural areas, underscoring the importance of urban planted areas, like gardens, in supporting honey bee populations. Establishing flowering plants in agricultural landscapes could help support honey bee populations.

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EcosystemsEnvironmental ScienceRemote Environments
Brianne Palmer

Who Pollinates a Potent Plant?

About once a decade, the corpse flower blooms and attracts human visitors of all ages who want to see the short-lived flower and smell the plant’s natural perfume of rotting flesh. But in the wild, these plants must attract a different kind of visitor –pollinators. Read on to learn more about the mysterious pollinators of the Corpse Flower and learn about the questions scientists still don’t know the answers to.

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CitiesClimateEcosystemsEnvironmental ScienceHuman Exposure and Public Health
Jessica Espinosa

How Air Pollution Regulation Can Affect Bird Populations

Although we have strong evidence that air pollution poses significant health risks to humans, how air pollutants affect plants and animals is not well studied. Birds are especially susceptible to air pollution because they have a unique way of breathing and interacting with air. Therefore, a group of scientists conducted a study on how air pollution affects North American birds and how air quality regulations, which were initially created to benefit humans, can also benefit these bird species.

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ClimateEcosystemsEnvironmental ScienceRemote Environments
Brianne Palmer

When Geological Processes Collide– Exploring the Link Between Earthquakes and Glaciers

What happens when glaciers melt? Scientists have discussed numerous effects of deglaciation including sea level rise and loss of habitats but recently, geologists have been thinking about how glaciers interact with the crust of the earth. Researchers from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks found a link between melting glaciers and earthquakes in Southeast Alaska which adds new understanding about the indirect effects of climate change and the role of humans in natural disasters.

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Animal behaviorCitiesEcosystems
Brianne Palmer

Combine Crickets and Lockdowns and get an Unlikely Experiment

In the spring of 2020, we all dealt with lockdowns in a different way. In urban parks, animals were suddenly exposed to a world without humans, and this disrupted ongoing urban ecology experiments. But resourceful ecologists used the sudden silence near businesses and the uptick of outdoor recreation to understand how shifting human behaviors change timing and duration of chirping urban crickets.

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