Author Archives: Science News Releases

High-educated US women want to start families again

An increasing number of highly educated women are opting for families, according to a national study co-authored by a University at Buffalo economist.

Qingyan Shang, an assistant professor at UB, says the study uncovers what may be the reversal of a trend by highly educated women.

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Booming economic growth has not increased Chinese life satisfaction

Economic growth Richard Easterlin

Richard A. Easterlin is University Professor and Professor of Economics, University of Southern California. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a former Guggenheim Fellow, and past president of the Population Association of America, and the Economic History Association.

Study of last 2 decades shows growing happiness gap between wealthy Chinese and the poorest, reflecting rising unemployment and deteriorating safety net, according to economist Richard Easterlin.

Despite an unprecedented rate of economic growth, Chinese people are less happy overall than they were two decades ago, reveals timely new research from Easterlin, one of the founders of the field of “happiness economics” and namesake of the Easterlin Paradox.

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Elephants and rhinos more than tip of forest biodiversity pyramid

The progressive disappearance of seed-dispersing animals like elephants and rhinoceroses puts the structural integrity and biodiversity of the tropical forest of South-East Asia at risk. With the help of Spanish researchers, an international team of experts has confirmed that not even herbivores like tapirs can replace them.

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Researchers map fish species at risk from dams

Dams are believed to be one of the biggest threats to freshwater organisms worldwide: They disrupt normal patterns of water and sediment flow, impede migration, and alter the character of spawning and feeding grounds. A shortage of data has until now prevented a thorough global assessment of the threat dams pose to fish species, but a study described in the June issue of BioScience attempts just that.

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Biodiversity often means linguistic diversity

Biodiversity hot spots — the world’s biologically richest and most threatened locations on Earth — and high biodiversity wilderness areas — biologically rich but less threatened — are some of the most linguistically diverse regions on our planet, according to a team of conservationists.

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Effects of climate change on mountain plants is delayed

Percentage of unsuitable occupied ecological sites

Percentage of unsuitable sites among those predicted to be occupied.

A modeling study from the European Alps suggests that population declines to be observed during the upcoming decades will probably underestimate the long-term effects of recent climate warming on mountain plants. A European team of ecologists around Stefan Dullinger from the Department of Conservation Biology, Vegetation and Landscape Ecology of the University of Vienna presents a new modeling tool to predict migration of mountain plants which explicitly takes population dynamic processes into account. Their results are published in “Nature Climate Change“.

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Dry riverbeds are ecological and cultural hotspots

‘When the River Runs Dry’ is a familiar song in Australia. Some rivers in the arid center of the continent flow only after a stiff monsoon season, and smaller tributaries all over the country commonly shrink to puddled potholes and dry river beds during the dry season. But rivers also run dry in more temperate climes. Much of the upper reaches and feeder streams of the great rivers of North America, and even the mighty Amazon, dry out seasonally.

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