Australian agtech innovation was in the spotlight recently when SwarmFarm Robotics founder Andrew Bate was awarded third place in the Agripreneur of the Year contest at the 2019 Future Agro Challenge Global Championships, beating competitors from more than 60 countries.

Professional pyrotechnician Zack James is lighting his next fuse under the tractor market. The founder of Rabbit Tractors develops autonomous farm robots intended for multiple tasks and to be scaled up in number as needed, challenging traditional tractors. Based in northwest Indiana, Rabbit Tractors is a so-called swarm farming startup among a field of like-minded Read article >

The post Field Day: AI Startup Cultivates Robo Tractors for ‘Swarm Farming’ Disruption appeared first on The Official NVIDIA Blog.

From Nov 2009 Southern Living magazine. This easy cider gets its tangy twist from fresh citrus. -- posted by Bren in LR

North Korea’s Kim Jong-un has sent a “verbal message” to Chinese leader Xi Jinping, state media KCNA reported on Friday, after weeks of speculation about his health.The news agency did not explain what it meant by a “verbal message,” and it was not clear if Kim and Xi had spoken directly.The message was “in connection with the fact that China is registering success in preventing the Covid-19 infection”, according to KCNA, with Kim extending his “warm greetings” to Xi.Rumours about Kim’s health…

Prague Daily Monitor

As seems to be the norm this winter, the Czech Republic had another day of record warm temperatures on Sunday. With the warm temperatures came high velocity winds which knocked out electricity for hundreds of homes in the western part of the country, caused traffic accidents and as much as a 30% halt in railways service.

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The worst invasion by desert locusts in decades has hit Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia. The swarms are destroying crops and could cost millions of dollars to contain

An analysis of eggshells from three kinds of dinosaurs shows they were all warm-blooded, suggesting that dinosaurs’ ancestors were also warm-blooded

Climate change is leading to lower numbers of marine life towards the equator – including mammals, birds, fish and plankton – while populations nearer the poles increase

There could be a planetary threshold beyond which the earth will keep warming even if we stop pumping out more fossil fuels - the so-called 'Hothouse Earth' scenario

Mountainsides are becoming less stable as glaciers retreat, leading to more landslides that can trigger massive - but localised - tsunamis

A fossil so well preserved that its skin is still flexible is revealing much more about the marine reptiles called ichthyosaurs that swam in the sea during the age of dinosaurs

Lessons from the deep past reveal that human-induced warming could create more extreme conditions than Earth has ever experienced

We now know that past periods when Earth cooled and warmed were only regional. The finding rebuffs the myth that today's planet-wide warming is a natural blip

Climate models show that as the world warms, tropical cyclones will travel more slowly, dumping more rain in one place and making high-speed winds batter buildings for longer

Satellites have revealed the fracking heartland of the US is leaking methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, at a record-breaking rate.

Two new reports suggest that the warm summer months will not significantly slow the novel coronavirus as it spreads around the globe.

Ana Gabriela Jimenez, Emily Cornelius Ruhs, Kailey J. Tobin, Katie N. Anderson, Audrey Le Pogam, Lyette Regimbald, and Francois Vezina

Seasonal changes in maximal thermogenic capacity (M_sum) in wild black-capped chickadees suggests that adjustments in metabolic performance are slow and begin to take place before winter peaks. However, when mean minimal ambient temperature (T_a) reaches –10°C, the chickadee phenotype appears to provide enough spare capacity to endure days with colder T_a, down to –20°C or below. This suggests that birds could also maintain a higher antioxidant capacity as part of their cold-acclimated phenotype to deal with sudden decreases in temperature. Here, we tested how environmental mismatch affected oxidative stress by comparing cold-acclimated (–5°C) and transition (20°C) phenotypes in chickadees exposed to an acute 15°C drop in temperature with that of control individuals. We measured superoxide dismutase, catalase and glutathione peroxidase activities, as well as lipid peroxidation damage and antioxidant scavenging capacity in pectoralis muscle, brain, intestine and liver. We generally found differences between seasonal phenotypes and across tissues, but no differences with respect to an acute cold drop treatment. Our data suggest oxidative stress is closely matched to whole-animal physiology in cold-acclimated birds compared with transition birds, implying that changes to the oxidative stress system happen slowly.

Flemming Dahlke, Magnus Lucassen, Ulf Bickmeyer, Sylke Wohlrab, Velmurugu Puvanendran, Atle Mortensen, Melissa Chierici, Hans-Otto Pörtner, and Daniela Storch

The vulnerability of fish embryos and larvae to environmental factors is often attributed to a lack of adult-like organ systems (gills) and thus insufficient homeostatic capacity. However, experimental data supporting this hypothesis are scarce. Here, by using Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) as a model, the relationship between embryo vulnerability (to projected ocean acidification and warming) and homeostatic capacity was explored through parallel analyses of stage-specific mortality and in vitro activity and expression of major ion pumps (ATP-Synthase, Na⁺/K⁺-ATPase, H⁺-ATPase) and co-transporters (NBC1, NKCC1). Immunolocalization of these transporters was used to study ionocyte morphology in newly-hatched larvae. Treatment-related embryo mortality until hatch (+20% due to acidification and warming) occurred primarily during an early period (gastrulation) characterized by extremely low ion transport capacities. Thereafter, embryo mortality decreased in parallel with an exponential increase in activity and expression of all investigated ion transporters. Significant changes in transporter activity and expression in response to acidification (+15% activity) and warming (-30% expression) indicate some potential for short-term acclimatization, although likely associated with energetic trade-offs. Interestingly, whole-larvae enzyme capacities (supported by abundant epidermal ionocytes) reached levels similar to those previously measured in gill tissue of adult cod, suggesting that early-life stages without functional gills are better equipped in terms of ion homeostasis than previously thought. This study implies that the gastrulation period represents a critical transition from inherited (maternal) defenses to active homeostatic regulation, which facilitates enhanced resilience of later stages to environmental factors.

The US Army has built a prototype device that allows wearers to go glove-free in freezing conditions. It works by heating the forearm, which helps keep the fingertips warm

Swarms of drones have been seen flying over Colorado, Nebraska and Wyoming in the past few weeks, but no one has claimed responsibility

Proxima Centauri b, a planet orbiting our nearest stellar neighbour, is being blasted with cosmic rays and solar flares – which could make it warm enough to host life

Asian giant hornet, which became more active in the state in April, is the world’s largest and can kill humans with multiple stings

• Alarm over deaths of bees from rapidly spreading viral disease
  

Researchers and citizens in Washington state are on a careful hunt for invasive “murder hornets”, after the insect made its first appearance in the US.

The Asian giant hornet is the world’s largest and can kill humans. But it is most dangerous for the European honeybee, which is defenseless in the face of the hornet’s spiky mandibles, long stinger and potent venom.

Yes, most infectious diseases are seasonal. But waiting for COVID-19 to wane on its own is a bad idea

The British public appeared to stick to the Government's advice on avoiding beaches and parks even as the UK saw its warmest day of the year so far.

This is the heartwarming moment more than 100 NHS staff applaud a nurse as she leaves intensive care after spending 23 days in the ward fighting for her life against coronavirus.

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2019 was the hottest year on record for Europe as global warming trends continue, major analysis has shown.

Temperatures in the UK could reach are set to reach up to 24C over the next couple days as a "remarkably" warm and dry April continues, the Met Office has said.

Britain is saying goodbye to weeks of warm weather with temperatures set to tumble for the sixth week of lockdown.

NHS ambulance staff have created a heartwarming video to say thank you to the community for the support they have received during the coronavirus crisis.

Swarm Technologies has struck an agreement with California-based Momentus for the launch of a dozen telecommunication satellites, each the size of a slice of bread, aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in December. The December rideshare mission is the first of a series that Momentum plans to execute for Swarm, continuing into 2021 and 2022. Swarm plans to have 150 satellites launched over the next couple of years for a communication network in low Earth orbit. The first 12 SpaceBee satellites covered by the agreement announced today will be deployed into orbit from the Falcon 9. The inch-thick satellites fit… Read More

'This type of natural manipulation in ecosystems ... has barely been researched to date, but holds tremendous potential,' says researcher

Meltwater caused a 500-metre slab of ice to cascade down an Alaskan valley — and researchers say warmer summers are making similar events more likely

With almost all football off because of the coronavirus, star players have found themselves at a loose end. How are they filling their time?

'That is the most exciting thing I've ever had happen!'

Sudden stratospheric warming it's great for the ozone layer at the South Pole, but not so great for heat and rain levels over the next few months.

Temperatures will reach highs of 23 Celsius (73F) and it will feel noticeably warmer along North Sea coasts.

A scattering of showers will develop, particularly during the afternoon.

Warm sunny spells and scattered showers today and tomorrow.

Saturday is set to be even hotter than Friday.

Warm sunny spells for many today, Sunday colder and windier.

Fancy your home as an "hermetically sealed space ship" this winter, and keeping warm to boot? Here's how you can do both and not pump out more electricity, gas or wood smoke.

Huge crowds flocked to shopping centres across Australia in a pre-Mother's Day rush which was good news for the retail industry, but set off alarm bells for a potential coronavirus spike, with one shopper describing the scenes like "swimming in a COVID soup".

Governors across the U.S. are encouraging people to continue practicing social distancing amid summer weather

Higher temperatures and wetter weather may spur soil microbes to release more carbon into the atmosphere

-- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com

A 1 degree Celsius rise corresponded to a 1.4 percent increase in suicides

Never let fashion get in between you and toasty toes.

Talk about a lose-lose situation: On one hand, not taking any action to repair the hole would allow harmful UV radiation to percolate through; on the other hand, helping to accelerate its recovery could strengthen global warming by

Photo courtesy of Next Nature American Climate Values Survey Views on global warming may be more strongly politically and economically influenced than many may have hoped. The recently released results of the American Climate Values Survey, conducted

Hosed by this theory or greenwashed? Photo by Tony Stl via Flickr On ABC's 20/20 last Friday, Nathan Myhrvold, Microsoft's former chief technology officer, and founder/CEO of Intellectual Ventures (IV), resurrected the idea of stretching a 2-inch