Despite years of declaring that conversion of high-voltage, long-distance electrical transmission lines to underground installation was cost prohibitive, Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) has announced plans to spend $20 billion over 10 years to bury 10,000 miles of power lines in wildfire-prone areas of California. The move comes after PG&E filed a preliminary report with the California […]
Arizona State University
Posted inLife
Initiative helps the public understand how news works in the digital age
January 22, 2020 – Public distrust in the media has taken on another dimension in the digital age. A poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and USAFacts confirms this new skepticism. The main findings are dismaying: almost half of all Americans say they have a hard time discerning if information is true, regardless […]
Posted inSci/Tech
Tiny airborne particles from wildfires have climate change implications
Sept. 9, 2019 – Wildfires are widespread across the globe. They occur in places wherever plants are abundant — such as the raging fires currently burning in the Brazilian Amazon. Such biomass burning (BB) can be an environmental calamity. The smoke from BB events produces large amounts of aerosol particles and gases. These emissions can cause major […]
Posted inSci/Tech
An innovative new diagnostic for Lyme disease
August 27, 2019 – When researchers examined the mitochondrial DNA of Ötzi, a man entombed in ice high in the Tyrolean Alps some 5,300 years ago, they made a startling discovery. Secreted within the tangles of the ice man’s genetic code was evidence he’d been infected with a bacterial pathogen, Borrelia burgdorferi. Ötzi is the […]
Posted inSci/Tech
Digital-age Tools and Technology Give Rise to Fake Videos
March 5, 2018 – Fake news videos aren’t new, but they are on the rise and more realistic than ever due to technological advances. What used to be a fairly big production and cost thousands of dollars can now be achieved with a selfie stick and a smartphone. That may not sound like a big […]
Posted inEnviro
Sustainability Scientist Says Shrinking National Monuments Will Stress Animals and Change Ecology
Oct. 30, 2017 – “Every man needs a place to go where he can go crazy in peace,” said author and desert rat Edward Abbey. There may soon be less of one of those places. President Donald Trump announced Friday he intends to shrink the size of the newest national monument, the 1.35 million acre […]
Posted inSci/Tech
What Lives in Floodwater? Q & A with an Environmental Microbiologist
Aug. 30, 2017 – Hurricane Harvey has poured more than 50 inches of rain over the Houston area since Aug. 25. Morteza Abbaszadegan, is an Arizona State University professor of environmental microbiology and engineering. He is the founding director of the National Science Foundation Water and Environmental Technology Center at ASU. His research expertise is […]