Northwest
There has been sharp disagreement in recent years about how much, or even whether, winter snowpack has declined in the Cascade Mountains of Washington and Oregon during the last half-century.
PORTLAND, Ore. - Oregon Health & Science University and the University of Washington, along with a number of partner institutions across the Northwest, have received federal funding to form a regional research center aimed at combating emerging or re-emerging infectious diseases that pose a serious threat to human health.
If Mark Twain were alive today he might rephrase his frequently cited observation about everyone talking about the weather but not doing anything about it to say, "Everyone reads or watches weather forecasts, but many people don't understand them."
Session: Deterministic Simulated Ground Motion Records Under ASCE/SEI (7-05: Guidance for the Geotechnical Industry
Location: DeAnza Ballroom 3, Thursday 9 April 2009, 8:30 a.m.
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Women experiencing physical abuse from intimate partners spent 42 percent more on health care per year than non-abused women, according to a long-term study of more than 3,000 women.
Many native fishes in the Pacific Northwest are threatened or endangered, notably salmonids, and hundreds of millions of dollars are expended annually on researching their populations and on amelioration efforts.
Tree deaths in the West's old-growth forests have more than doubled in recent decades, likely from regional warming and related drought conditions.
The newest studies on the Cascadia Subduction Zone off the coast of the Pacific Northwest have identified a "clustering" of great earthquakes of the type that would cause a major tsunami, yielding a historical record with two distinct implications - one that's good, the other not. According to scientists at Oregon State University, this subduction zone has just experienced a cluster of four massive earthquakes during the past 1600 years, and if historical trends continue, this cluster could be over and the zone may already have entered a long quiet period of 500 to 1,000 years, which appears to be common following a cluster of earthquake events.
The type of devastating tsunami that struck the southern coast of Asia is entirely possible in the Pacific Northwest of the United States, but might not cause as much loss of life there because of better warning systems, according to experts at Oregon State University. OSU is home to the Tsunami Wave Basin at the Hinsdale Wave Research Laboratory, one of the world's leading research facilities to study tsunamis and understand their behavior, catastrophic effects and possible ways to reduce the destruction they can cause.
The field of biology is undergoing a revolution, transformed by sophisticated technologies from a qualitative, descriptive science to one that's quantitative and predictive. These technologies are producing a wealth of biological data that, once collected, analyzed and interpreted holistically, will form the basis for applications ranging from the development of cancer treatments to the creation of novel bioremediation technologies that will help clean up the worst Superfund sites.
A huge, largely underground industry has been built on the moss that drapes some forest trees, raising ecological concerns, questions about export of potentially invasive species, and other issues that have scientists, land managers and businesses unsure about how to monitor, regulate or control this market amid so many uncertainties.
Researchers at the University of Washington have found a species of crow that distinctly alters its behavior when attempting to steal food from another crow, depending on whether or not the other bird is a relative. The Northwestern crow (Corvus caurinus) uses a passive strategy when it attempts to take food from kin but becomes aggressive when it tries to steal a morsel from a non-related crow. This is believed to be the first time that such a behavior pattern has been observed in any bird species.
This is something that's been talked about for years, though before Sept. 11 it was always in the context of a bank or high-security government facility, not Northwest Airlines. The upshot of this Washington Times article is that NASA and Northwest are teaming to see if mind-reading technology is feasible, and if so, can it be used to mass-screen airline passengers. Opinion is mixed, and no one in this article addresses the pharmaceutical countermeasures that could potentially be employed to calm a guilt- or panic-ridden brain and heart. Still, plenty creepy.
