Day: July 21, 2020

A new study indicates that the accelerated melting of Arctic permafrost could release as much as 40 billion tons of carbon into the atmosphere not previously accounted for in global emissions estimates.  Permafrost is the thick layer of soil in the world’s Arctic and Antarctic regions that, for centuries in some cases, has remained frozen throughout the year. It is vital to the world’s climate because it stores twice as much carbon as there is in the atmosphere.   The study, published Monday in the science journal Nature Geoscience, examines how under usual circumstances, the top layer of this frozen soil thaws during summer when plants and microorganisms spring to life. The microbes eat plant roots and respirate like all living organisms and inevitably emit greenhouse gases, mostly carbon dioxide. This process is known as rhizosphere priming. The researchers say with more and more of the prior frozen soil thawing, more plant roots are exposed to microorganisms, which in turn emit more carbon dioxide. The researchers determined the phenomenon could add as much as 40 billion tons of carbon to the atmosphere by the year 2100.  Prior to this study, scientists estimated that global emissions must fall by 7.6% every year over the next 10 years to meet the 1.5°C temperature goal of the Paris Agreement. But the authors of the study note that their new estimates of emissions from permafrost melting are currently “unaccounted for in global emission scenarios and implies that the remaining anthropogenic carbon budget to keep warming below 1.5 or 2 °C … may need to be even more constrained.” While Earth is heating up, warming is significantly worse in the Arctic. Analysis from NASA and the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration suggest that the past decade was the hottest on record overall. In the Arctic, air temperatures are rising twice as fast as the global average. This new study shows that permafrost melt can, in turn, prompt further melt. More carbon in the atmosphere means worsened atmospheric warming and more melting. 
 
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A study of the Arctic says polar bears are one of the most threatened species on earth because of melting sea ice caused by climate change, and without aggressive steps, the animals could be extinct by the end of the century. The University of Toronto study, published Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change, says that polar bears rely on sea ice to reach their prey, usually seals and other water mammals. Researchers who conducted the study say a loss of ice will force the animals onto land, where they must rely on fat reserves due to a lack of food. Co-author of a report on the study Steven Amstrup says the bears currently have less time to feed and a longer time to wait until the ice returns.  He says typically, the ice melts in the early summer and midsummer and returns in fall.  “That period when the ice is absent is getting ever longer and the bears are facing that longer period with less fat on board.” Modelling was used to determine polar bears’ energy requirements while fasting and the thresholds that would limit their survival, alongside a model predicting the future number of days without ice. The researchers used that to estimate when the survival thresholds would be surpassed for 13 Arctic sub-populations that represent 80% of all polar bears. Under a high greenhouse gas emissions scenario, the researchers found the bears’ survival would be “unlikely” in much of the Arctic due to reduced sea ice. But the study maintains that if there was a “moderate emissions scenario” more sub-populations could survive through this century. 
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With over 14.7 million confirmed novel coronavirus cases and nearly 610,000 fatalities, researchers are reporting progress in the race to develop a safe and effective vaccine against the disease.  Two different experimental vaccines — one developed in a joint venture between Britain’s Oxford University and British-Swedish drug maker AstraZeneca, the other by Chinese biotech firm CanSino Biologics — have produced strong immune responses in late-stage human trials, according to two peer-reviewed studies published Monday in the British medical journal The Lancet.   Meanwhile, U.S. drug maker Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech also reported positive progress Monday on their vaccine candidate.  The vaccine developed by the joint Oxford-AstraZeneca partnership is receiving the most attention, with the company having signed agreements with many governments to supply its vaccine if it is proved to be effective and granted regulatory approval. The company has already committed to making 2 billion doses.  According to The New York Times, the doses have been administered to more than 10,000 volunteers in Britain, Brazil and South Africa, with 30,000 participants in the United States set to receive the experimental vaccine next week.A subject receives a shot in the first-stage safety study clinical trial of a potential vaccine by Moderna for COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle.Monday’s news comes a week after U.S.-based biotech firm Moderna announced a vaccine developed by researchers at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease had also produced strong immune responses in its late-stage human trials, although it came with mild or moderate side effects such as fatigue, headaches, chills and muscle aches. But Dr. Peter Hotez, the dean of tropical medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, told CNN Monday that “ the first vaccines may not be our best vaccines.”  Dr. Hotez said it will probably take a year “to accumulate all the data showing the vaccines actually work, as well as that they’re safe.” Meanwhile, European Union leaders reached an agreement early Tuesday on a $2.1 trillion budget and coronavirus relief package.      The agreement includes $857 billion in coronavirus funding that will be issued as loans and grants to the hardest-hit countries.    It came after negotiations stretched on for four days and nights, well beyond what was expected.  A main sticking point was a divide between a group of five richer countries in the north, including the Netherlands and Austria, that advocated a cut in the original proposal of $572 billion in grants along with stricter spending controls, while others such as Spain and Italy sought to keep such restrictions to a minimum.  The final agreement included a compromise of $446 billion in grants.  During an Oval Office meeting with Republican lawmakers on Monday about a new coronavirus financial rescue package, President Donald Trump announced that he will resume the daily press briefings of his coronavirus task force, beginning Tuesday.  The president led the briefings over the course of several weeks in the early days of pandemic, but ended them in April after he was widely criticized for an offhand suggestion that doctors could inject bleach into COVID-19 patients to counteract the disease. Trump also used the briefings to tout the use of hydroxychloroquine as a treatment, despite medical experts’ warnings that the drug ineffective and has possibly deadly side effects.   The return of the daily briefings comes as the U.S. has topped 3.8 million confirmed COVID-19 infections and nearly 141,000 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Research Center. After weeks of downplaying the need for Americans to wear masks as an effective means to prevent spreading the virus, Trump also tweeted a photo of himself wearing a mask.  He wrote that “many people say that it is Patriotic to wear a face mask when you can’t socially distance. There is nobody more Patriotic than me, your favorite President!”We are United in our effort to defeat the Invisible China Virus, and many people say that it is Patriotic to wear a face mask when you can’t socially distance. There is nobody more Patriotic than me, your favorite President! pic.twitter.com/iQOd1whktN— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 20, 2020
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