Do Accents Help Plants Grow? Dey Do Dough, Don’t Dey Dough?

According to “research” by Plants4Life, a UK organisation set up to promote plants in the home and the office, “It is a fact that houseplants love a good chat!” and Liverpool accents in particular. The organization says, “Research has shown that talking to our houseplants can help them to grow big and healthy but no one…
Read Further

If I get sick, will she know what to do?

Copyright: John & Penny Hubley   This blog is contributed by Dr Neil Pakenham-Walsh, Coordinator of HIFA2015 , the global campaign and email forum focussed on informed healthcare provision in developing countries. We in richer countries take for granted that our healthcare providers have access to the information they need to make informed decisions... Every…
Read Further

Trick or treat?

Universities in Colombia are using their national newspapers to raise awareness of science in their country. Is that a trick or a treat?
Read Further

Putting a value on Mau Forest

Photo courtesy of United Nations Environment Programme. Mau Forest Complex forms the largest closed-canopy forest ecosystem of Kenya.  It is the single most important water catchment in the Rift Valley and western Kenya. As Dave pointed out in his blog article last year, the ecosystem services provided by Mau Forest support key economic sectors, including…
Read Further

Carbon sequestration: Could GM trees be the key?

New research in the latest issue of BioScience examines the prospects for enhancing biological carbon sequestration through a variety of policy and technical approaches, including the deployment of genetically engineered trees and other plants. Forests of genetically altered trees and other plants could sequester several billion tons of carbon from the atmosphere each year and…
Read Further

The market triumph of ecotourism?

 Lake in Tambopata region As Editor of CABI's Leisure Tourism Database, I get to keep up to date with news and research in the leisure and tourism industry. It's always of interest to follow developments in places I've been to, so my attention was grabbed last week by an email from the University of East…
Read Further

Solving the UK’s future energy needs with organic waste

Recently, the UK Committee on Climate Change (CCC) sent a letter to the Climate Minister Chris Huhne, in reply to Huhne's earlier letter requesting update on the level of the UK renewable energy ambition to 2020. In the reply letter the CCC suggested that one of the country’s renewable energy targets (to obtain 10% of…
Read Further

On your bike?

One of my colleagues is sitting at her desk with a bag full of bars of Fairtrade chocolate today. No, she's not suddenly acquired an overwhelming chocolate craving. It's all part of 'Green Travel to Work Day', in which local businesses around Wallingford, where CABI has it's headquarters, are encouraging their employees to find environmentally…
Read Further

World Tourism Day – Tourism and Biodiversity

2010 is the International Year of Biodiversity. In keeping with this global initiative, this years World Tourism Day (held every year on 27 September) has the theme "Tourism and Biodiversity". The official World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) celebrations were held in Guangzhou, China, bringing together government representatives, biodiversity researchers and private industry representatives. Many countries have…
Read Further

How the atmosphere above the Amazon rainforest – the purest air on Earth – can help to cool the planet

Scientists from Harvard and São Paulo University (USP) carried out a research to try and find out how the planet’s climate was before the industrial revolution. For this they were searching for the purest air in the planet and found it in the atmosphere above the Amazon rainforest. The study is crucial to understand cloud…
Read Further