Research News
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More than half of cocoa from the world’s largest producer cannot be traced to its origin
Over 55% of cocoa exports from Côte d’Ivoire, the world’s leading cocoa producing country, cannot be traced to their origins, leaving consumers in the dark about the chocolate they eat. Lack of traceability raises difficulties under forthcoming EU legislation which will see chocolate producers held responsible for ensuring exports are not linked to deforestation. Cocoa […]
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20,000 premature US deaths caused by human-ignited fires
Over 80% of premature deaths caused by small smoke particles in the United States result directly from human-ignited fires. This is the outcome of a study published today in IOP Publishing’s journal Environmental Research Letters. The new study, led by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, analyses the impact of smoke particles on air […]
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Drivers in Washington, California, and New York benefit most from switching to electric vehicles
90% of vehicle-owning US households could reduce their bills as well as their carbon footprint by switching to electric vehicles. 85 million households could halve their transport bills by going electric compared to just 25 thousand households if they switched to newer, gasoline-fuelled cars. Adopting an electric vehicle would more than double the number of US […]
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Refreezing poles feasible and cheap, new study finds
The poles are warming several times faster than the global average, causing record smashing heatwaves that were reported earlier this year in both the Arctic and Antarctic. Melting ice and collapsing glaciers at high latitudes would accelerate sea level rise around the planet. Fortunately, refreezing the poles by reducing incoming sunlight would be both feasible […]
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Most Precise Test of General Relativity’s Weak Equivalence Principle published
In new studies published in Physical Review Letters and a special issue of IOP Publishing’s Classical and Quantum Gravity journal on September 14, a team of researchers present the most precise test yet of the Weak Equivalence Principle, a key component of the theory of general relativity. The report describes the final results from the […]
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Residential exposure to petroleum refining could be related to strokes in the southern United States
A new study has revealed that exposure to pollutants from petroleum refineries has a strong link to stroke rates across the Southern United States. The results were published today in IOP Publishing’s journal Environmental Research Letters. The southern United States (US) has a high concentration of petroleum production and refining (PPR). This process emits multiple […]
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Exposure to past temperature variability may help forests cope with climate change
Understanding how forests are responding to climate change is critical to planning effective forest management and climate policy. A new study out today in the first issue of Environmental Research: Ecology, published by IOP Publishing, assessed effects of past and current climate variability on global forest productivity. The work highlights sensitive regions where forests may […]
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The cost of climate change on economic growth
New study Examines Impact of Rising Global Temperatures on GDP. From crop damage to cooling failures at cloud-based data centers, climate change affects a wide variety of economic sectors. It’s unclear whether a country’s economy can bounce back each year from these impacts or if global temperature increases cause permanent and cumulative impacts on the […]
