One of the most concerning issues to modern ecology and society is the ongoing loss of biodiversity. Ecosystems are now losing species at rates only seen in previous mass extinction events (Hails, 2008; Barnosky et al., 2011) with rates of extinction between 100 and 1000 times higher than pre-human levels (Pimm et al., 1995). This loss, in turn, is impairing the functioning of ecosystems (Worm ...

What one experiences today as atmosphere is a transient snapshot and result of its evolutionary history. Much of the development and present status was explained based both on scientific knowledge, and combined with established facts, even speculation. The planet Earth was formed around 4600 million years ago by the gravitational accretion of relatively small rocks and dust, within the solar ne...

Dangerous Anthropogenic Interference The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) commits signatory nations (which includes all major nations including the United States) to stabilizing greenhouse gas concentrations at levels short of DAI. To properly define DAI, one must take into account issues that are not only scientific, but, as I have argued elsewhere (2), economic, ...

[1] Elevated mercury (Hg) in marine and terrestrial ecosystems is a global health concern because of the formation of toxic methylmercury. Humans have emitted Hg to the atmosphere for millennia, and this Hg has deposited and accumulated into ecosystems globally. Here we present a global biogeochemical model with fully coupled atmospheric, terrestrial, and oceanic Hg reservoirs to better underst...

All major rivers in northwestern Germany that flow into the North Sea, including the Weser River, display rare earth element (REE) patterns with large positive gadolinium (Gd) anomalies that indicate the presence of anthropogenic Gd derived from contrast agents used in magnetic resonance imaging. This microcontaminant cannot be removed by common sewage treatment technology and enters rivers and...

We estimated the oceanic inventory of anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) from 1980 to 1999 using a technique based on the global chlorofluorocarbon data set. Our analysis suggests that the ocean stored 14.8 petagrams of anthropogenic carbon from mid-1980 to mid-1989 and 17.9 petagrams of carbon from mid-1990 to mid-1999, indicating an oceanwide net uptake of 1.6 and 2.0 +/- 0.4 petagrams of car...

The compositions of humic acids (HAs) isolated from cultivated and forested "Terra Preta de Indio" or Amazonian Dark Earth soils (anthropogenic soils) were compared with those from adjacent non-anthropogenic soils (control soils) using elemental and thermogravimetric analyses, and a variety of solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance techniques. The thermogravimetric index, which indicates the mo...

Woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) in Ontario are a threatened species that have experienced a substantial retraction of their historic range. Part of their decline has been attributed to increasing densities of anthropogenic linear features such as trails, roads, railways, and hydro lines. These features have been shown to increase the search efficiency and kill rate of wolves. Howev...