More than half the European passenger fleet is diesel-powered. Although the European Union has been progressively tightening vehicle emissions for decades, new diesel cars still produce on-road nitrogen oxide emissions that far exceed the current standard. Efforts to reduce diesel emissions would likely make the cars more costly, but experts say it can—and should—be done.

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The deep ocean was once assumed to be lifeless and barren. Today we know that even the deepest waters teem with living creatures, some of them thought to be little changed from when life itself first appeared on the planet. The deep ocean is also essential to the earth’s biosphere—it regulates global temperatures, stores carbon, provides habitat for countless species, and cycles nutrients for marine food webs. Currently stressed by pollution, industrial fishing, and oil and gas development, these cold, dark waters now face another challenge: mining.

Malnutrition in children can manifest in different ways; malnourished children can be underweight or obese, or their height can be stunted. Global health experts used to measure progress toward meeting childhood malnutrition goals on the basis of improvements in weight. But now stunting is the top priority. That’s because children who lose weight from a few days of being sick or hungry can readily gain it back, while the stunting that results from chronic malnourishment during early development has permanent consequences.

All around the world, oil and gas companies are being forced by resource declines to drill in less accessible areas, and the Arctic is their newest frontier. The geology above the Arctic Circle—that is, everything above latitude 66.56°N—holds an estimated 90 billion barrels of oil and 1,669 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, or 22% of the world’s undiscovered conventional resources, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

As Royal Dutch Shell and other oil companies prepare to drill offshore in the Alaskan Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), a new report commissioned by the Washington, DC–based Pew Environment Group concludes current response capabilities aren’t adequate to contain and clean up a major spill in the area.1 Marilyn Heiman, who directs the group’s U.S. Arctic program, says drilling on the Alaskan OCS requires a science-based precautionary approach. “And right now, we don’t know enough about the potential consequences of a spill to the ecosystem,” she says.

On 27 May 2010, with crude oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico after the explosion of BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig, the Obama administration announced it would pause offshore drilling plans in the Arctic Ocean, one of the planet’s most pristine ecosystems.

Imagine the most sophisticated engineering feat you can think of, and you might not consider a living cell. And yet cells are fabulously sophisticated, able to produce all the proteins, tissues, and biological circuits that give rise to life. Scientists have spent hundreds of years just trying to understand cells and to work with them as they were created by nature.

When it comes to industrial lead processing, The Doe Run Company

Hypotheses about the genesis of novel H1N1 influenza (the pandemic strain of swine flu) range far and wide. Some public health and epidemiology experts are taking a fresh look at concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) , which they say provide ideal conditions that facilitate the mutation of viral pathogens into novel strains.

There's a new market growing in the United States, but unlike others trading in tangible commodities, this one trades in the absence of something that no one wants: greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. According to industry figures, the global markets for both voluntary offsets and those sold to meet compliance requirements are growing rapidly, and U.S.