Monday, 25 March, 2019

WWF Report: Half of Global Wildlife Lost

Posted on Thursday, 2 October, 2014Sunday, 20 August, 2017 by Zheluo Cai

The 2014 Living Planet Report, World Wildlife Fund’s biennial flagship publication, was released this week. The warning bell is loud and clear, that between 1970 and 2010, populations of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish around the globe dropped 52 percent. This regrettable state of affairs is not new, when the chair of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services warned two years ago, that the world is loosing species at a rate that is 100 to 1,000 times faster than the natural extinction rate. This biodiversity loss occurs disproportionately in low-income countries, and correlates with the increasing resource use of high-income countries.

Read a summary of the Report here:

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/29/earth-lost-50-wildlife-in-40-years-wwf

Download the full 2014 Living Planet Report here:

http://wwf.panda.org/about_our_earth/all_publications/living_planet_report/

Credits: National Geographic

Warning - Cyclone Idai in Mozambique, Malawi, and Zimbabwe Friday, 22 March, 2019
Parts of Mozambique, Malawi, and Zimbabwe have been severely affected by Tropical Cyclone Idai. US residents should avoid nonessential travel to Beira City and the surrounding area in Mozambique. Travelers to other affected parts of Mozambique, Malawi, and Zimbabwe should take steps to prevent illness and injury.
Alert - Drug-Resistant Infections in Patients Who Had Weight-Loss Surgery in Mexico Friday, 15 March, 2019
Some US residents returning from Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico, have been diagnosed with infections caused by an antibiotic-resistant form of Pseudomonas aeruginosa bacteria. (weight loss surgery, bariatric, Tijuana, Mexico, Grand View Hospital, VIM, carbapenemase)

ASTRONOMY PHOTO OF THE DAY: Star Cluster Terzan 5. Credit: Nick Risinger, DSS, Hubble, NASA, ESA, ESO. Globular clusters once ruled the Milky Way. Today, there are less than 200 left. Many globular clusters were destroyed by repeated encounters with each other or the Galactic centre. Surviving relics are older than any other structures in our Galaxy. The globular cluster Terzan 5 has been found to contain not only stars formed in the early days of our Milky Way Galaxy, but also, quite surprisingly, others that formed in a separate burst of star formation about 7 billion years later.

NASA Mission Reveals Asteroid Has Big Surprises Tuesday, 19 March, 2019
A NASA spacecraft that will return a sample of a near-Earth asteroid named Bennu to Earth in 2023 made the first-ever close-up observations of particle plumes erupting from an asteroid’s surface.
NASA Television to Air Three Upcoming Spacewalks, Preview Briefing Friday, 15 March, 2019
Four astronauts are preparing for their first spacewalks outside the International Space Station, scheduled for March 22, March 29 and April 8.

Ukraine - Level 2: Exercise Increased Caution Thursday, 21 March, 2019
Exercise increased caution in Ukraine due to crime, civil unrest and elections. Some areas have increased risk. Read the entire Travel Advisory. Do not travel to: Crimea due to arbitrary detentions and other abuses by Russian occupation authorities. The eastern parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, especially the non-government-controlled areas, due to armed conflict. Crime […]
Comoros - Level 2: Exercise Increased Caution Thursday, 21 March, 2019
Exercise increased caution in The Union of the Comoros due to the upcoming presidential election. Comoros will hold elections on March 24, 2019, and April 21, 2019, if a run-off election is warranted. Travel within Comoros may be disrupted during these times by roadblocks and political demonstrations. From March 21-March […]

THE FLAG OF PORTUGAL: The flag is a rectangular bicolour with a field unevenly divided into green on the hoist, and red on the fly. The lesser version of the national coat of arms (i.e. armillary sphere and Portuguese shield) is centred over the colour boundary at equal distance from the upper and lower edges. On 30 June 1911, less than a year after the downfall of the constitutional monarchy, this design was officially adopted. The green and red represent the hope of the nation (green) and the blood of those who died defending it.

WORK OF ART: American Gothic is a 1930 painting by Grant Wood in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago. The painting depicted the American Gothic House in Eldon, Iowa, along with “the kind of people I fancied should live in that house;” a farmer standing beside a woman who has been interpreted to be his sister. The figures were modelled by Wood’s sister, Nan Wood Graham, and their dentist, Dr Byron McKeeby. American Gothic is one of the most familiar images in 20th-century American pop art scene.

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