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Plant hormone could help produce biofuels

Scientists at The University of Manchester have identified how a plant hormone can affect the rate of cell division in vascular tissue in plants. The findings demonstrate how the hormone controls plant growth to produce more biomass which could be used to make the next generation of biofuels.

Nov 14th, 2012

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Melting glaciers raise sea level

Anthropogenic climate change leads to melting glaciers and rising sea level. Between 1902 and 2009, melting glaciers contributed 11 cm to sea level rise. They were therefore the most important cause of sea level rise.

Nov 14th, 2012

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Researchers find new access to abundant biomass for advanced biofuels

After cellulose, xylan is the most abundant biomass material on Earth, and therefore represents an enormous potential source of stored solar energy for the production of advance biofuels. A major roadblock, however, has been extracting xylan from plant cell walls. Researchers have taken a significant step towards removing this roadblock by identifying a gene in rice plants whose suppression improves both the extraction of xylan and the overall release of the sugars needed to make biofuels.

Nov 12th, 2012

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Plastic waste set in concrete

A new method designed to create expanded construction nodules from mixed plastic waste may replace the expanded clay traditionally used in light concrete that is not used for structural part of a building and often contains air bubbles.

Nov 12th, 2012

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Rise and fall of the Maya in response to climate change

An international and interdisciplinary team of scientists including Norbert Marwan from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) presents a precisely dated, high resolution regional climate record for the past 2000 years that for the first time shows how the Maya political systems developed and disintegrated in response to climate change.

Nov 9th, 2012

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Integrating electric vehicles into power grids

Europe is paving the way for a transition from fossil fuels toward sustainable forms of energy. EU-funded scientists are developing technology and tools to facilitate integration of electric vehicles (EVs) into electricity grids.

Nov 9th, 2012

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