Today’s Google Starred Items: “Africa’s bumper crop of dust”
Sid Perkins: “The researchers found that for most of the last 3,200 years, changes in precipitation were strongly correlated with dust emissions. But since the early 1800s — a time that coincided with the arrival of commercial agriculture in the western Sahel — dust emissions have increased substantially, says Mulitza. Early that century, Portuguese settlers in Africa began farming maize, which was soon replaced by millet and sorghum. But dust emissions really skyrocketed when farmers began growing groundnuts such as peanuts during the region’s ‘cash crop revolution,’ which dates to the 1840s.”
“How plants and animals fight back when deals go sour”
Susan Milius: “Most dramatic are the lethal punishments enacted by otherwise harmless-looking partners. ‘Plants can be brutal,’ Kiers notes. Other creatures deliver sanctions that aren’t so harsh, or instead switch partners when things don’t work out. And in some cases of natural larceny, the cheating amounts to an annoyance that is easier to live with than to fight.”
“Researchers revamp ideas about what’s in the sun”
Alexandra Witze: “But over the past several years, scientists have dramatically overhauled estimates of the sun’s chemical makeup. In particular, they say there may be far less of key elements such as oxygen, carbon and nitrogen than previously thought. These changes are major enough to throw into question other basic assumptions about the sun, such as ideas about how sound waves travel through its interior, ringing it like a gong.”