Monday, February 14, 2011
Friday, February 11, 2011
Royal Institution Christmas Lectures 2010
The Royal Institution (see website at this link) is an organization devoted to scientific education and research. It was founded in 1799. Since 1825 it has been presenting lectures at christmas.
In 2010 the lecture was given by Mark Miodownik a materials scientist (see his website here). The topic was Size Matters.
In 2010 the lecture was given by Mark Miodownik a materials scientist (see his website here). The topic was Size Matters.
Why does size matters in animal behaviour?
How can a hamster survive falling from the top of a skyscraper, ants carry over 100 times their own body weight and geckos climb across the ceiling?
In the first of this year's Christmas lectures, Dr Mark Miodownik investigates . He reveals how the science of materials - the stuff from which everything is made - can explain some of the most extraordinary and surprising feats in the animal kingdom.
By the end, you will understand why you will never see an elephant dance
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Climate change impacts on ocean ecosystems
The video is of a talk by Ove Hoegh-Guldberg one of Australia's foremost Oceanographers, who specialises in coral reaf ecosystems. The talk was part of a symposium on Oceans and Living Marine Ecosystems.
The symposium was summarised as follows:
Ove Hoegh-Guldberg NCSE talk from John Bruno on Vimeo.
The symposium was summarised as follows:
Rapidly rising greenhouse gas concentrations are driving ocean systems toward conditions not seen for millions of years, with an associated risk of fundamental and irreversible ecological transformation. Changes in biological function in the ocean caused by anthropogenic climate change go far beyond death, extinctions and habitat loss: fundamental processes are being altered, community assemblages are being reorganized and ecological surprises are likely. This session will bring together experts from around the world to outline the most up to date science on how anthropogenic climate change is altering the structure and functioning of marine ecosystems.
Primary Messages:
1. There is a large body of empirical evidence indicating that anthropogenic climate change is substantially impacting ocean ecosystems. The evidence comes from many taxa, locations and habitats.
2. Changes in biological function in the ocean caused by anthropogenic climate change go far beyond death, extinctions and habitat loss: fundamental processes are being altered, community assemblages are being reorganized and ecological surprises are likely.
3. These changes will have significant consequences for people.
Ove Hoegh-Guldberg NCSE talk from John Bruno on Vimeo.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
2010: a very hot year
The year 2010 was a very hot one globally. Probably the best description is that it was effectively a dead heat with the previoous warmest year. Certainly Roy Spencer (a global warming skeptic) and James Hansen (a global warming proponent) seem to agree on that point.
As Spencer notes:
As far as the race for warmest year goes, 1998 (+0.424 deg. C) barely edged out 2010 (+0.411 deg. C), but the difference (0.01 deg. C) is nowhere near statistically significant. So feel free to use or misuse those statistics to your heart’s content.
And according to Hanson:
NASA’s announcement this year – that 2010 ties 2005 as the warmest year in the 131-year instrumental record – made headlines. But, how much does the ranking of a single year matter?
Not all that much, emphasizes James Hansen, the director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York City. In the GISS analysis, for example, 2010 differed from 2005 by less than 0.01°C (0.018 °F), a difference so small that the temperatures of these two years are indistinguishable, given the uncertainty of the calculation.
It is interesting that both point to the same difference between the preivously warmest year (0.010 C), though Spencer's is cooler that the previously warm year and Hansen's is warmer. Those who are not familiar with the different temperature data sets may be surprised that Hansen and Spencer name two different years as the "previous warmest". For a discussion of the different temperature sets see the Hansen link above. For my take on the different temperature records see this post.
Below are charts showing data and trends for the five main temperature records. I charted from 1979 because UAH and RSS start from that date. As always click on the graphics for larger and clearer versions. (For a description of the method that I used to produce these charts see the appendix at the end of this post.)
All of the data sets show a strong warming trend since 1979. Some people argue that global warming has stopped sometime in the last 12 years, either 1998, 2001 or 2002. I have discussed this issue at this post, and concluded:
For the reasoning that led to those conclusions check the post.
Even if we ignore basic statistics and fall for the skeptics' trick of using short term time spans the argument still does not hold water. The chart below shows the years that have a negative trend to the end of 2010:
So bending over backwards to make the skeptic argument (and breaking some basis statistical rules in the process) we have only 1/5 of the trends from 2001 that are negative. Note also that half of the negative trends come from one data set - HadCRU. There is an enoumous irony here as climate skeptics try to discredit climate science by claiming (on the basis of stolen emails) that HadCRU distort the climate record to show excessive warming!
Appendix
To produce these charts I followed the steps below:
1. I downloaded the data for each of the data sets. To do this I used programming procedures (RClimate.txt) developed by Kelly O'Day. The program that I wrote used O'Day's procedures to download each of the five data sets to a separate file. This is an easy way to ensure that data is accurate and up to date, as the producers of the data sometimes revise the values of earlier months.
The section of code below references O'Day's functions to download the data. I did not include the functions as they are quite long - they can be found in the RClimate.txt file. The major change that I made to Kelly O'Day's code was an output_link that was appropriate to my directory structure.
## The functions require the packages ggplot2 and reshape to operate so make sure that the packages are loaded
library(ggplot2)
library(reshape)
##Get and store GISS data
m <- func_GISS() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_GISS.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store Hadley Data m <- func_HAD() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_HAD.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store NOAA data m <- func_NOAA() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_NOAA.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store RSS data m <- func_RSS() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_RSS.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store UAH data m <- func_UAH() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_UAH.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F)
2. I used programs that I wrote to chart the data. The code for producing the NOAA chart can be seen below. The only difference in the files to chart the other data sets is the name of the .csv file in the link line. These programs will chart data from any time in the data set up to the latest data. The date to start should be entered in the yearfrom = line.
########### NOAA data and trend analysis ##############
## STEP 1: SETUP - Source File Link
par(las=1)
link <- "C:\\Learn_R\\data_NOAA.csv"
## STEP 2: READ DATA
my_data <- read.table(link, sep = ",", dec=".", skip = 0, row.names = NULL, header = T, colClasses = rep("numeric", 2), na.strings = c("", "*", "-", -99.99,99.9, 999.9), col.names = c("yr","yr_frac", "temperature"))
## STEP 3: MANIPULATE DATA ## Change the year in the next line to the year that # you want to plot data and trends from, not before 1880!! yearfrom = 1979 Title <- c("NOAA data and trend from", yearfrom) newdata <-(subset(my_data, yr>=yearfrom))
## STEP 4:CREATE PLOT AND TREND LINE
plot(temperature ~ yr, data = newdata, type="l", col = "red", xlab = "year", ylab = "temp", main = Title)
abline(lm(temperature ~ yr, data = newdata), col = "blue")
As Spencer notes:
As far as the race for warmest year goes, 1998 (+0.424 deg. C) barely edged out 2010 (+0.411 deg. C), but the difference (0.01 deg. C) is nowhere near statistically significant. So feel free to use or misuse those statistics to your heart’s content.
And according to Hanson:
NASA’s announcement this year – that 2010 ties 2005 as the warmest year in the 131-year instrumental record – made headlines. But, how much does the ranking of a single year matter?
Not all that much, emphasizes James Hansen, the director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York City. In the GISS analysis, for example, 2010 differed from 2005 by less than 0.01°C (0.018 °F), a difference so small that the temperatures of these two years are indistinguishable, given the uncertainty of the calculation.
It is interesting that both point to the same difference between the preivously warmest year (0.010 C), though Spencer's is cooler that the previously warm year and Hansen's is warmer. Those who are not familiar with the different temperature data sets may be surprised that Hansen and Spencer name two different years as the "previous warmest". For a discussion of the different temperature sets see the Hansen link above. For my take on the different temperature records see this post.
Below are charts showing data and trends for the five main temperature records. I charted from 1979 because UAH and RSS start from that date. As always click on the graphics for larger and clearer versions. (For a description of the method that I used to produce these charts see the appendix at the end of this post.)
All of the data sets show a strong warming trend since 1979. Some people argue that global warming has stopped sometime in the last 12 years, either 1998, 2001 or 2002. I have discussed this issue at this post, and concluded:
There are three major reasons that disprove the claims that global temperatures are not increasing:
1. their reliance on short time preiods to produce trends - which is statistically absurd
2. their use of the complex concept of statistical significance to give a false impression to those who don't understand any statistics
3. their reliance on just one of the many indicators of warming temperatures.
For the reasoning that led to those conclusions check the post.
Even if we ignore basic statistics and fall for the skeptics' trick of using short term time spans the argument still does not hold water. The chart below shows the years that have a negative trend to the end of 2010:
| GISS | 2005 |
| HadCRU | 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 |
| NOAA | 2002 2003 2004 |
| RSS | 2002 |
| UAH | ----- |
So bending over backwards to make the skeptic argument (and breaking some basis statistical rules in the process) we have only 1/5 of the trends from 2001 that are negative. Note also that half of the negative trends come from one data set - HadCRU. There is an enoumous irony here as climate skeptics try to discredit climate science by claiming (on the basis of stolen emails) that HadCRU distort the climate record to show excessive warming!
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Appendix
To produce these charts I followed the steps below:
1. I downloaded the data for each of the data sets. To do this I used programming procedures (RClimate.txt) developed by Kelly O'Day. The program that I wrote used O'Day's procedures to download each of the five data sets to a separate file. This is an easy way to ensure that data is accurate and up to date, as the producers of the data sometimes revise the values of earlier months.
The section of code below references O'Day's functions to download the data. I did not include the functions as they are quite long - they can be found in the RClimate.txt file. The major change that I made to Kelly O'Day's code was an output_link that was appropriate to my directory structure.
## The functions require the packages ggplot2 and reshape to operate so make sure that the packages are loaded
library(ggplot2)
library(reshape)
##Get and store GISS data
m <- func_GISS() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_GISS.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store Hadley Data m <- func_HAD() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_HAD.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store NOAA data m <- func_NOAA() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_NOAA.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store RSS data m <- func_RSS() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_RSS.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F) ##Get and store UAH data m <- func_UAH() head(m) output_link <- "C://Learn_R/data_UAH.csv" write.csv(m, output_link, quote=FALSE, row.names = F)
2. I used programs that I wrote to chart the data. The code for producing the NOAA chart can be seen below. The only difference in the files to chart the other data sets is the name of the .csv file in the link line. These programs will chart data from any time in the data set up to the latest data. The date to start should be entered in the yearfrom = line.
########### NOAA data and trend analysis ##############
## STEP 1: SETUP - Source File Link
par(las=1)
link <- "C:\\Learn_R\\data_NOAA.csv"
## STEP 2: READ DATA
my_data <- read.table(link, sep = ",", dec=".", skip = 0, row.names = NULL, header = T, colClasses = rep("numeric", 2), na.strings = c("", "*", "-", -99.99,99.9, 999.9), col.names = c("yr","yr_frac", "temperature"))
## STEP 3: MANIPULATE DATA ## Change the year in the next line to the year that # you want to plot data and trends from, not before 1880!! yearfrom = 1979 Title <- c("NOAA data and trend from", yearfrom) newdata <-(subset(my_data, yr>=yearfrom))
## STEP 4:CREATE PLOT AND TREND LINE
plot(temperature ~ yr, data = newdata, type="l", col = "red", xlab = "year", ylab = "temp", main = Title)
abline(lm(temperature ~ yr, data = newdata), col = "blue")
Thursday, February 3, 2011
The Cigar Song
Here is an entertaining song by Brad Paisley about an insurance scam.
I became aware of this story when I received the email below from a friend:
You couldn't make this up!
BEST LAWYER / INSURANCE STORY OF THE YEAR,
DECADE, AND POSSIBLY THE CENTURY.
This took place in Charlotte, North Carolina. A lawyer purchased a box of very rare and expensive cigars, then insured them against, among other things, fire.
Within a month, having smoked his entire stockpile of these great cigars, the lawyer filed a claim against the insurance company.
In his claim, the lawyer stated the cigars were lost 'in a series of small fires' ... The insurance company refused to pay, citing the obvious reason, that the man had consumed the cigars in the normal fashion.
The lawyer sued and WON! ( Stay with me. )
Delivering the ruling, the judge agreed with the insurance company that the claim was frivolous. The judge stated nevertheless, that the lawyer held a policy from the company, in which it had warranted that the cigars were insurable and also guaranteed that it would insure them against fire, without defining what is considered to be unacceptable 'fire' and was obligated to pay the claim.
Rather than endure lengthy and costly appeal process, the insurance company accepted the ruling and paid $15,000 to the lawyer for his loss of the cigars that perished in the 'fires'.
NOW FOR THE BEST PART...
After the lawyer cashed the cheque, the insurance company had him arrested on 24 counts of ARSON!!!
With his own insurance claim and testimony from the previous case being used against him, the lawyer was convicted of intentionally burning his insured property and was sentenced to 24 months in jail and a $24,000 fine. This true story won First Place in last year's Criminal Lawyers Award contest..
ONLY IN AMERICA .... NO WONDER THE REST OF THE WORLD THINKS THEY'RE NUTS!
The heading of this email is somewhat ironic as the story was made up, as shown here, here and here .
For more information on email hoaxes see this post.
I became aware of this story when I received the email below from a friend:
You couldn't make this up!
BEST LAWYER / INSURANCE STORY OF THE YEAR,
DECADE, AND POSSIBLY THE CENTURY.
This took place in Charlotte, North Carolina. A lawyer purchased a box of very rare and expensive cigars, then insured them against, among other things, fire.
Within a month, having smoked his entire stockpile of these great cigars, the lawyer filed a claim against the insurance company.
In his claim, the lawyer stated the cigars were lost 'in a series of small fires' ... The insurance company refused to pay, citing the obvious reason, that the man had consumed the cigars in the normal fashion.
The lawyer sued and WON! ( Stay with me. )
Delivering the ruling, the judge agreed with the insurance company that the claim was frivolous. The judge stated nevertheless, that the lawyer held a policy from the company, in which it had warranted that the cigars were insurable and also guaranteed that it would insure them against fire, without defining what is considered to be unacceptable 'fire' and was obligated to pay the claim.
Rather than endure lengthy and costly appeal process, the insurance company accepted the ruling and paid $15,000 to the lawyer for his loss of the cigars that perished in the 'fires'.
NOW FOR THE BEST PART...
After the lawyer cashed the cheque, the insurance company had him arrested on 24 counts of ARSON!!!
With his own insurance claim and testimony from the previous case being used against him, the lawyer was convicted of intentionally burning his insured property and was sentenced to 24 months in jail and a $24,000 fine. This true story won First Place in last year's Criminal Lawyers Award contest..
ONLY IN AMERICA .... NO WONDER THE REST OF THE WORLD THINKS THEY'RE NUTS!
The heading of this email is somewhat ironic as the story was made up, as shown here, here and here .
For more information on email hoaxes see this post.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Tropical cyclones in a warming world
What will be the effect on Tropical Cyclones (Hurricanes) as the world warms?
It is likely that extreme weather events will occur more frequently , but the effect on Tropical Cyclones is a complex one and open to misunderstanding.
The first half of the video below outlines the scientific evidence which can be summarised as follows:
1. There will be fewer tropical cyclones because of global warming ...
2. ... but those storms that do make landfall will be more powerful. So there will be more strong storms.
3. We are currently in a phase of heightened hurrican activity becasuse of a natural 60 to 80 year cycle that began in 1995 (in the Atlantic).
4. There is evidence to suggest that recent hurricanes may have become stronger because of global warming, but this isn't conclusive.
The Australian Bureau of Meteorology has posted an article on tropical cyclones at this link which agrees with the information presented in the video, as the following quotation shows:
The second half of the video discusses the issue of sea level rise and low lying islands. Again the evidence is interesting and complex. Even if low lying islands will not be drowned, storm surges, coral bleaching and ocean acidification are a definite threat.
Appendix
Below are the sources that the creator of the video used:
1) NBC news report: "Hurricanes and Global Warming Connection" on YouTube
2) "Changes in Tropical Cyclone Number, Duration, and Intensity in a Warming Environment"
Webster et al, Science 2005
3) Half-degree increase in temp leads to approx 40% increase in hurricanes:
"Large contribution of sea surface warming to recent increase in Atlantic hurricane activity"
-- Saunders and Lea, Nature 2008
4) 60- to 80- year hurricane cycle responsible for hurricane activity:
"The Recent Increase in Atlantic Hurricane Activity: Causes and Implications."
Goldenberg et al, Science 2001
5) Photo of Hurrican Igor showing temperature difference:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD...
6) Increased wind shear decreases hurricane activity:
"The Recent Increase in Atlantic Hurricane Activity: Causes and Implications." -- Goldenberg et al, Science 2001
and "Increased tropical Atlantic wind shear
in model projections of global warming" -- G. Vecchi, B. Soden, Geophysical Research Letters, 2007
7) paper postulating fewer tropical storms:
"Tropical Cyclones and Global Climate Change: A Post-IPCC Assessment"
-- Henderson-Sellers et al, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 1998
8) Papers confirming fewer storms:
"Increased tropical Atlantic wind shear
in model projections of global warming" -- G. Vecchi, B. Soden, Geophysical Research Letters, 2007
"Simulated reduction in Atlantic
hurricane frequency under 21st century
warming conditions."
-- Tom Knutson, Nature Geoscience 2008
"Warmer Ocean Could Reduce Number
Of Atlantic Hurricane Landfalls"
-- Wang et al, Geophysical Research Letters 2008
9) Expert panel paper:
"Tropical Cyclones and Climate Change"
-- Knutson et al, Nature Geoscience 2010
10) 10% increase in wind speed translates to a roughly 60% increase in damage:
"Climate and tropical cyclone activity: A new model"
11) Increase in number and proportion of category 4 and 5 hurricanes:
"Changes in Tropical Cyclone Number, Duration, and Intensity in a Warming Environment"
-- Webster, Science 2005
12) Nature paper that reached the same conclusion:
"Increasing destructiveness of tropical cyclones over the past 30 years"
-- K. Emanuel, Nature 2005
13) Global warming a factor in increased sea surface temperatures:
"Global Warming Surpassed Natural Cycles In Fueling 2005 Hurricane"
-- Trenberth and Shea, Geophysical Research Letters 2006
14) Boston Globe story "Katrina's Real Name" (Boston Globe August 30, 2005) at:
http://www.boston.com/news/weather/ar...
15) Fox news report on hurricane inactivity:
"Global Warming No Hurricanes" on YouTube
16) Global Warming = More Hurricanes at:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/09/22...
17) Discovery channel report on rising sea levels "Global warming -- what you need to know" found at:
"Kiribati - Global warming" on YouTube.
18) BBC report on Tuvalu found at "Tuvalu Island in the South Pacific" on YouTube.
19) Studies on accretion of coral atolls:
"Tropical cyclone creates a new land
formation on Funafuti atoll" -- J.E. Maragos et al, Science 1973.
"The nature and origin of coral reef
islands." -- Stoddart and Steers, Biology and Geology of
Coral Reefs 1977.
"Reef-island accretion and soil
development on Makin, Kiribati...."
-- Woodroffe and Morrison, CATENA, 2001
"The morphological response of atoll
islands to sea-level rise" -- Cowell and Kench. Journal of Coastal
Research 2001
Below are the rest of my sources for the last video (they wouldn't all fit on the original video description)
"New model of reef-island evolution...."
-- Kench et al, Geology 2005
20) Study showing 23 of 27 Pacific atolls stable or increasing in size:
"The dynamic response of reef islands to sea-level rise: Evidence from multi-decadal
analysis of island change in the Central Pacific"
-- Webb and Kench, Global and Planetary Change 2010-11-23
21) "Coral Reefs - Feeling the Heat with Jeff Corwin" on YouTube, produced by Defenders of Wildlife.
22) Explanation of bleaching:
"Bleaching Patterns of Four Species of Carribean Reef Corals" -- Fitt and Warner, Biology Bulletin 1995
"Coral bleaching: causes and consequences"
-- B. E. Brown, Coral Reefs, 1997
23) Most coral unable to change algae:
"Most corals may not change their symbionts."
-- TL Goulet, Marine Ecology Progress 2006
24) Refutation of Goulet:
"Multiple symbiotic partnerships are common in scleractinian corals, but not in octocorals:
Comment on Goulet"
-- Baker and Romanski, Marine Ecology Progress 2007
25) Coral thrived in northern latitudes during warm past:
"Correlations between sea surface temperature, circulation patterns and the distribution of hermatypic
corals of Japan"
-- Jen Veron, Continental Shelf Research, 1992
26) Coral may have difficulty migrating due to human activity:
"Coral reefs and Global Climate Change"
-- The Pew Center 2004
27) Potential acidification of oceans:
"Anthropogenic Decline in High-Latitude Ocean Carbonate by 2100"
-- JC Orr et al, nature 2005
It is likely that extreme weather events will occur more frequently , but the effect on Tropical Cyclones is a complex one and open to misunderstanding.
The first half of the video below outlines the scientific evidence which can be summarised as follows:
1. There will be fewer tropical cyclones because of global warming ...
2. ... but those storms that do make landfall will be more powerful. So there will be more strong storms.
3. We are currently in a phase of heightened hurrican activity becasuse of a natural 60 to 80 year cycle that began in 1995 (in the Atlantic).
4. There is evidence to suggest that recent hurricanes may have become stronger because of global warming, but this isn't conclusive.
The Australian Bureau of Meteorology has posted an article on tropical cyclones at this link which agrees with the information presented in the video, as the following quotation shows:
There have been three recent studies producing projections for tropical cyclone changes in the Australian region. Two suggest that there will be no significant change in tropical cyclone numbers off the east coast of Australia to the middle of the 21st century. The third study, based on the CSIRO simulations, shows a significant decrease in tropical cyclone numbers for the Australian region especially off the coastline of Western Australia. The simulations also show more long-lived eastern Australian tropical cyclones although one study showed a decrease in long-lived cyclones off the Western Australian coast.
Each of the above studies finds a marked increase in the severe Category 3 - 5 storms. Some also reported a poleward extension of tropical cyclone tracks.
The second half of the video discusses the issue of sea level rise and low lying islands. Again the evidence is interesting and complex. Even if low lying islands will not be drowned, storm surges, coral bleaching and ocean acidification are a definite threat.
Appendix
Below are the sources that the creator of the video used:
1) NBC news report: "Hurricanes and Global Warming Connection" on YouTube
2) "Changes in Tropical Cyclone Number, Duration, and Intensity in a Warming Environment"
Webster et al, Science 2005
3) Half-degree increase in temp leads to approx 40% increase in hurricanes:
"Large contribution of sea surface warming to recent increase in Atlantic hurricane activity"
-- Saunders and Lea, Nature 2008
4) 60- to 80- year hurricane cycle responsible for hurricane activity:
"The Recent Increase in Atlantic Hurricane Activity: Causes and Implications."
Goldenberg et al, Science 2001
5) Photo of Hurrican Igor showing temperature difference:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD...
6) Increased wind shear decreases hurricane activity:
"The Recent Increase in Atlantic Hurricane Activity: Causes and Implications." -- Goldenberg et al, Science 2001
and "Increased tropical Atlantic wind shear
in model projections of global warming" -- G. Vecchi, B. Soden, Geophysical Research Letters, 2007
7) paper postulating fewer tropical storms:
"Tropical Cyclones and Global Climate Change: A Post-IPCC Assessment"
-- Henderson-Sellers et al, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 1998
8) Papers confirming fewer storms:
"Increased tropical Atlantic wind shear
in model projections of global warming" -- G. Vecchi, B. Soden, Geophysical Research Letters, 2007
"Simulated reduction in Atlantic
hurricane frequency under 21st century
warming conditions."
-- Tom Knutson, Nature Geoscience 2008
"Warmer Ocean Could Reduce Number
Of Atlantic Hurricane Landfalls"
-- Wang et al, Geophysical Research Letters 2008
9) Expert panel paper:
"Tropical Cyclones and Climate Change"
-- Knutson et al, Nature Geoscience 2010
10) 10% increase in wind speed translates to a roughly 60% increase in damage:
"Climate and tropical cyclone activity: A new model"
11) Increase in number and proportion of category 4 and 5 hurricanes:
"Changes in Tropical Cyclone Number, Duration, and Intensity in a Warming Environment"
-- Webster, Science 2005
12) Nature paper that reached the same conclusion:
"Increasing destructiveness of tropical cyclones over the past 30 years"
-- K. Emanuel, Nature 2005
13) Global warming a factor in increased sea surface temperatures:
"Global Warming Surpassed Natural Cycles In Fueling 2005 Hurricane"
-- Trenberth and Shea, Geophysical Research Letters 2006
14) Boston Globe story "Katrina's Real Name" (Boston Globe August 30, 2005) at:
http://www.boston.com/news/weather/ar...
15) Fox news report on hurricane inactivity:
"Global Warming No Hurricanes" on YouTube
16) Global Warming = More Hurricanes at:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/09/22...
17) Discovery channel report on rising sea levels "Global warming -- what you need to know" found at:
"Kiribati - Global warming" on YouTube.
18) BBC report on Tuvalu found at "Tuvalu Island in the South Pacific" on YouTube.
19) Studies on accretion of coral atolls:
"Tropical cyclone creates a new land
formation on Funafuti atoll" -- J.E. Maragos et al, Science 1973.
"The nature and origin of coral reef
islands." -- Stoddart and Steers, Biology and Geology of
Coral Reefs 1977.
"Reef-island accretion and soil
development on Makin, Kiribati...."
-- Woodroffe and Morrison, CATENA, 2001
"The morphological response of atoll
islands to sea-level rise" -- Cowell and Kench. Journal of Coastal
Research 2001
Below are the rest of my sources for the last video (they wouldn't all fit on the original video description)
"New model of reef-island evolution...."
-- Kench et al, Geology 2005
20) Study showing 23 of 27 Pacific atolls stable or increasing in size:
"The dynamic response of reef islands to sea-level rise: Evidence from multi-decadal
analysis of island change in the Central Pacific"
-- Webb and Kench, Global and Planetary Change 2010-11-23
21) "Coral Reefs - Feeling the Heat with Jeff Corwin" on YouTube, produced by Defenders of Wildlife.
22) Explanation of bleaching:
"Bleaching Patterns of Four Species of Carribean Reef Corals" -- Fitt and Warner, Biology Bulletin 1995
"Coral bleaching: causes and consequences"
-- B. E. Brown, Coral Reefs, 1997
23) Most coral unable to change algae:
"Most corals may not change their symbionts."
-- TL Goulet, Marine Ecology Progress 2006
24) Refutation of Goulet:
"Multiple symbiotic partnerships are common in scleractinian corals, but not in octocorals:
Comment on Goulet"
-- Baker and Romanski, Marine Ecology Progress 2007
25) Coral thrived in northern latitudes during warm past:
"Correlations between sea surface temperature, circulation patterns and the distribution of hermatypic
corals of Japan"
-- Jen Veron, Continental Shelf Research, 1992
26) Coral may have difficulty migrating due to human activity:
"Coral reefs and Global Climate Change"
-- The Pew Center 2004
27) Potential acidification of oceans:
"Anthropogenic Decline in High-Latitude Ocean Carbonate by 2100"
-- JC Orr et al, nature 2005
Crazy action scene
Endhiran is an Indian Science Fiction movie. To find out more details of the film see this link.
Here is a summary of the film's plot:
The film's story revolves around a scientist's struggle to control his creation, an android robot whose programme was upgraded to give it the ability to comprehend and generate human emotions. The plan backfires as the robot falls in love with the scientist's fiancée and is further manipulated to bring destruction to the world when it lands in the hands of a rival scientist. How the robot is stopped from further destruction forms the rest of the plot.
The final action sequence (below) is truly amazing.
Here is a summary of the film's plot:
The film's story revolves around a scientist's struggle to control his creation, an android robot whose programme was upgraded to give it the ability to comprehend and generate human emotions. The plan backfires as the robot falls in love with the scientist's fiancée and is further manipulated to bring destruction to the world when it lands in the hands of a rival scientist. How the robot is stopped from further destruction forms the rest of the plot.
The final action sequence (below) is truly amazing.
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