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Plastics Industry Disrupted by NZ Company - Humble Australian Bee

Forget your plastics. There is a naturally occurring material with better properties. It is produced in the nests of the Australian masked bee. The substance is resistant to fire and repels water. Furthermore, it is very strong. A company called the Humble Bee located on New Zealand is reverse-engineering the cellophane-like material in an attempt to create a biodegradable substitute for plastic.  If successful, world pollution will be substantially reduced. We are so dependent on things made from oil. The little bees sourced from Noosa in Queensland hold out great hope for a reduction in such products. A way of trapping the Hylaeus nubilosus has been developed by Chris Fuller of Kin Kin. Veronica Harwood-Stevenson has spent her house deposit and winnings from the Wellington Regional Economic Development Agency's Bright Ideas Challenge on the project. It is in the early stages. Ways of manufacturing are being studied. The aim is to initially make outdoor apparel and

Corals in High-Latitude Western Australia Regulate Chemistry to Cope With Cold

Corals at high-latitude locations in Australia, i.e., towards the south, can change their chemistry in order to adapt to colder conditions. Unfortunately, the sea is heating up not cooling down. The analysis was done by the Australian Research Centre (ARC) at the University of WA. (Australia western). A warmer ocean could be expected to slow down coral growth in Bremer Bay but the animals altered their chemical composition. Indeed, they are flourishing. It seems that growing in a cold condition is what they do best. The two-year study showed that it is only tropical reefs that are under threat. There is more food available in cooler regions. By extrapolation it can be surmised that corals situated in hotter areas get less nutrition with global warming. % ai corals za high-latitude oh reefs gu internal ex coral el chemistry oi growth ta temperatures % + a corals i high-latitude oh reefs ah internal by coral id chemistry my growth ax temperatures as ross an cooler am wester

Giant Chickens Roamed Australia

Xmas dinner would be a real pig-out if the giant chooks were still around. ◘1 Giant for Chickens or Roamed it xxxxxxxx giant ◘1 Large flightless birds in the northern and southern hemispheres evolved independently. This proves that animals evolve to fill environmental niches. Chicken-like birds as large as a horses lived in Australia 50,000 years ago.         ◙2 yyyyyyyyyy giant roamed chickens giant ◙2 If they were around today, they could provide an evening meal for a whole street. Imagine the size of eggs in the supermarket. Of course there would be a lot of humongous animals running around trying to eat us.   ⦿3 zzzzzzzzzzz in roamed on chickens in giant large birds ⦿3 Dromornithidae  were not exactly like chickens. They had bulbous beaks and weighed in at 650  kilograms . Not related to emus, they roamed right across the continent.  Mihirungs  fossils dating back 50 million years have been found.       ⧗ sex ⧗      ⧗ or animals ⧗ It is presumed that the common ances

Mutation Killed off the Woolly Mammoth

When a warmer climate spread across the world, mammoths were in deep trouble.  Melting snow together with predation by humans made the animals extinct.  There numbers dwindled to zero in 6,000 years.  A strange thing happened during this time.  The species tried to adapt and threw up countless mutations.  Most were destructive.   | ▶ optimum not stories news. | mutations mammoths killed ◀ | The long dark coat, so good as insulation from the cold, became like satin and light could shine through it.  They got severe irritable bowel syndrome due to their loss of smell.    It stopped them from mating due to protein changes in the creature's urine.    | ▶ | australian| mutations ◀ |     These changes are now known from two specimens in Siberia.  One on the mainland and another on a rock island.  It was the slightly later Wrangel Island specimen that had an over representation of genetic mutations. Those who want to save threatened species must now be careful. Inbreeding could