“Virus Evolutionis a new Open Access journal focusing on the long-term evolution of viruses, viruses as a model system for studying evolutionary processes, viral molecular epidemiology and environmental virology.
The aim of the journal is to provide a forum for original research papers, reviews, commentaries and a venue for in-depth discussion on the topics relevant to virus evolution.”
“Editors-in Chief, Professor Oliver Pybus, University of Oxford, and Professor Santiago Elena, Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (CSIC-UPV) welcome submissions at:https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/vevolu.” Source of information: Knowledgespeak Newsletter, Feb. 9, 2015
“Our Mission: NBC Learn believes in the power of great stories — historic news reports, original video content, and current events coverage — to engage, inspire and educate K-12 and Higher Ed students.” Among the free resources there are those that deal with the science of sports, chemistry, and environmental issues.
Featured this month is: “Finishing the Dream” — Martin Luther King Jr’s “Dream”
“Current Awareness Services have been published by libraries for a long time. They usually include new books, table of contents alerts, blogs, citation alerts, and other information. JournalTOCs builds on the idea by offering tables of contents (TOCs) for the newest issues of thousands of academic journals via this free website. Readers may type in the name of any journal in the search function on the homepage to access that journal’s latest table of contents. They may also browse by publishers and subjects. For librarians, students, and scholars who want to keep up to date on the breaking research in their field, this is a valuable resource. [CNH]“
Source: The Scout Report, Vol. 21(4), University of Wisconsin, Jan. 30, 2015
“Vaccinations have had a profound impact on human health, and yet there remains a lot of misinformation floating around out there regarding vaccines. (No, no, no, they do not cause autism.) The History of Vaccines website by the College of Physicians of Philadelphia is an excellent educational resource that covers many different aspects of vaccines and their history, including information about the science of vaccines, vaccine-preventable diseases, misconceptions about vaccines, and answers to the question, “why vaccinate?” Beyond articles addressing each of these (and many other) topics, the website includes a number of interactive features such as timelines, animations, and activities for students. Activities include, among others, a game in which players try to develop vaccines to protect a population of a society fighting disease, as well as a game that has players apply the scientific method to epidemiological scenarios.”
4-star website according to “Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News”
“Almost half of the processes that are crucial to maintaining the stability of the planet have become dangerously compromised by human activity. That is the view of an international team of 18 researchers who provide new evidence of significant changes in four of the nine systems which regulate the resilience of the Earth.”
Nine planetary boundaries (the crucial processes)
Change in biosphere integrity (biodiversity loss and species extinction)
Stratospheric ozone depletion
Biogeochemical flows (phosphorus and nitrogen cycles)
Land-system change (for example deforestation)
Atmospheric aerosol loading (microscopic particles in the atmosphere that affect climate and living organisms)
Introduction of novel entities (e.g. organic pollutants, radioactive materials, nanomaterials, and micro-plastics). Journal Reference:
Will Steffen, Katherine Richardson, Johan Rockström, Sarah E. Cornell, Ingo Fetzer, Elena M. Bennett, R. Biggs, Stephen R. Carpenter, Wim de Vries, Cynthia A. de Wit, Carl Folke, Dieter Gerten, Jens Heinke, Georgina M. Mace, Linn M. Persson, Veerabhadran Ramanathan, B. Reyers, and Sverker Sörlin.Planetary boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planet.Science, 15 January 2015 DOI:10.1126/science.1259855
Source: McGill University. “Nearly half the systems crucial to stability of planet compromised.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 15 January 2015. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/01/150115163533.htm>.
*NLM Technical Bulletin, Nov-Dec 2014, NLM Resource Update: TOXMAP Now Includes EPA Coal Plant Emissions Data
Data was obtained from theAir Markets Program Data(AMPD) tool, a publicly-available data system for searching and downloading data collected as part of EPA emissions trading programs. In 2013, about 2.1 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions were attributable to electricity generated from coal.