128 articles from FRIDAY 23.8.2019

Macron spearheads pressure on Bolsonaro over Amazon fires

France's Emmanuel Macron led a growing wave of international pressure on Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro over the fires raging in the Amazon rainforest Friday, telling him Paris would block efforts to seal a major trade deal. The issue will be high on the agenda when global leaders meet for the G7 summit Saturday in the French resort of Biarritz, where they are also set to tackle global trade...

AP Explains: The causes and risks of the Amazon fires

Fires have been breaking out at an unusual pace in Brazil this year, causing global alarm over deforestation in the Amazon region. Brazil's National Space Research Institute, which monitors deforestation, has recorded 76,720 wildfires across the country this year, as of Thursday. The agency says it doesn't have figures for the area burned, but deforestation as a whole has accelerated in the...

The causes and risks of the Amazon fires

Fires have been breaking out at an unusual pace in Brazil this year, causing global alarm over deforestation in the Amazon region. The world's largest rainforest is often called the "lungs of the earth." Here's a look at what's happening:

Scientists explore outback as testbed for Mars

This week, scientists from NASA's upcoming Mars 2020 mission joined their counterparts from the joint European-Russian ExoMars mission in an expedition to the Australian Outback, one of the most remote, arid regions on the planet. Both teams came to hone their research techniques before their missions launch to the Red Planet next summer in search of signs of past life on Mars.

NASA’s BITSE Solar Scope Is Ready for Balloon Flight Over New Mexico

Portal origin URL: NASA’s BITSE Solar Scope Is Ready for Balloon Flight Over New MexicoPortal origin nid: 450703Published: Friday, August 23, 2019 - 15:31Featured (stick to top of list): noPortal text teaser: NASA is getting ready to test a new way to see the Sun, high over the New Mexico desert: a coronagraph called BITSE. BITSE will fly up to the edge of the atmosphere...

Geoengineering: 'Plan B' for the planet

Paris (AFP) - Dismissed a decade ago as far-fetched and dangerous, schemes to tame global warming by engineering the climate have migrated from the margins of policy debates towards centre...

Scientists harvest eggs of last two surviving white rhino to pull species from brink of extinction

A Jurassic Park-style plan to bring back an effectively extinct species took a step towards being realised after scientists successfully harvested eggs from world's last two northern white rhino.  Northern white rhino was thought to be doomed forever when Sudan, the planet's last male, died at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya in March 2018.    He was survived only by Najin, 30 and...