Strawberry Moon lights up night sky in Visakhapatnam

 Residents in Vizag enjoyed the Strawberry Moon, also the supermoon of the year. The Strawberry Moon is one of the most colorful moons of the year because of its low, shallow path across the sky. Many people in Visakhapatnam throng the sea beach to enjoy the Strawberry Moon.

They could watch the strawberry moon on a clear night on June 5, 2020. The full moon night in June is generally called strawberry moon in many parts of the world as during some ancient civilisations, this was the perfect time to pick strawberries. This strawberry moon was doubly special as it coincided with the penumbral eclipse of the moon.

G7 ministers agree new steps against fossil fuels to fight against Climate Change

 The world's major nations have taken further significant steps to help limit climate change.

G7 environment ministers have agreed that they will deliver climate targets in line with limiting the rise in global temperatures to 1.5C.

That's far more ambitious than the previous 2C maximum.

Ministers also agreed to stop direct funding of coal-fired power stations in poorer nations by the end of 2021.

There's wriggle room in the statement, but the decision will send a clear message to development banks that still fund coal power in poor countries.

There's also an important commitment to safeguarding 30% of land for nature by 2030 to boost wildlife and help soak up carbon emissions.

Environment ministers from the UK, the US, Canada, Japan, France, Italy and Germany took part in the virtual G7 meeting, which is one of a series leading to the leaders' gathering in Cornwall in June.

The online meeting was led by the UK, and a government source told BBC News: "We're pretty encouraged by the outcomes."

The decisions that have been taken are an important stepping-stone on the road towards the vital global climate summit in Glasgow in November called COP26.

The move to keep their policies in line with 1.5C implies much faster action to cut emissions by 2030, rather than by mid-century.

Nick Mabey from the climate think tank E3G told BBC News: "This is looking good.

"It puts the burden on any fossil fuel development now to prove that it's 1.5C compatible."

The ministers are said to have been heavily influenced by a recent report from the rich nations' energy think tank, the IEA.

The study said that if the world wanted to reach net-zero emissions by the middle of the century, then there could be no new coal, oil or gas development from now on.

The G7 ministers agreed much more cash was needed to help fast-growing economies such as India and Indonesia to get clean technology. This decision will be pushed forward at the G7 Finance ministers' meeting on 4 June.

The communique issued by the ministers at the end of the meeting said: "We will phase out new direct government support for carbon-intensive international fossil fuel energy." This is expected to mean coal and oil.

But there's no date for enactment of the policy, with Japan arguing against strong strictures against coal. The UK hopes Japan will bend further on this by the Glasgow conference in November.

Another statement in communique said: "We commit to take concrete steps towards an absolute end to new direct government support for unabated international thermal coal power generation by end of 2021."

The UK Environment Secretary George Eustice told a news conference that the G7 would work towards ending unregulated fishing - and strive to improve marine biodiversity in international waters.

The US special climate envoy John Kerry said the meeting showed a unique sense of urgency - and unity. He said the G7 had understood the need to make sure some groups of people aren't left behind by the coming low-carbon revolution.

The ministers agreed that the world should move towards zero emission vehicles. The G7 were joined by India, Australia, South Africa and South Korea who have guest status at the meeting.

The elephant not in the room was China. The UK's tactic is not to blame the world's biggest carbon emitter, but to lay down a challenge.

Written by  Roger Harrabin, BBC environment analyst

Gene sequencing bacteria in natural environment sheds new light on antimicrobial resistance

 A team of researchers from multiple institutions in the U.K. and the U.S. has learned more about the development of antimicrobial resistance by studying hundreds of samples of bacteria in their natural environments. In their paper published in the journal Science Advances, the group describes how they conducted genome sequencing on hundreds of bacterial samples collected from a wide variety of natural environments and what they learned by doing so.

Over the past decade, medical scientists have grown concerned as more of the kinds of bacteria responsible for infections grow immune to antimicrobial agents meant to kill them. Such antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has become more of a threat in recent times as resistance continues to grow. In this new effort, the researchers have looked at a type of bacteria that are behind intestinal infections. These Enterobacteriaceae include familiar bacteria such as E. coli.

The researchers began their effort by noting that most efforts aimed at better understanding resistance in bacteria have centered around closed environments, such as specimens collected from patients in hospitals. They wondered if more might be learned by taking a look at such bacteria in more natural environments, such as in the soil, in ponds or even in wastewater in treatment plants. To learn more, they collected 2,292 samples from 19 different sites. The samples were then separated allowing the researchers to conduct genome sequencing on 827 kinds of bacteria (553 of which were E. coli).

In looking at their data, the researchers found that some species of bacteria, such as E. coli, that lived in the same environment (such as a pond) shared more genes than had been expected. Notably, they are of a type where genes can move between individual bacterium via horizontal gene transfer. Such sharing was much less likely, they also noted, in more isolated environments. The researchers also found more AMR genes inside of plasmids than in chromosomes. They suggest their findings indicate that Enterobacteriaceae demonstrate both dynamic and plastic AMR gene dissemination and that it is important for researchers involved in AMR efforts to consider natural environments.

The researchers plan to continue their work—they next aim to investigate overlap in environments, including those that involve humans directly.

Scientists Want to Send 6.7 Millions of Sperm and Egg Samples to Moon for Lunar Gene Bank

 Earth’s increasingly precarious state of things has always worried scientists. And ever since space exploration began, colonizing other bodies in the solar system has been the underlying vision for humans to find permanent settlements in space. The science community’s perpetual fixation on building habitats on other planets of our solar system and our natural satellite, the Moon, have been in the works for a long time. While the moon among other space bodies may not be an ideal place for a permanent residence, it could serve as a storage unit for our invaluable resources.

According to a New York Post report, scientists have proposed to establish a lunar gene bank that could house a repository of reproductive cells, sperm and egg samples from 6.7 million of Earth’s species, including humans. The proposed bank or ‘ark’ to be built on the moon is seen as a ‘modern global insurance policy.’

At a recent aerospace conference, Mechanical and aerospace engineer Jekan Thanga, whose team at the University of Arizona submitted their report, proposed setting up a lunar gene bank by shipping millions of sperm and egg samples for safekeeping. Thanga, speaking at the annual Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Aerospace Conference on Saturday, said that as the planet’s growing instability, an ‘Earth-based repository’ would leave the collected specimen vulnerable. He wants to jumpstart a cross planetary of sorts by starting a human seed vault on the moon at the earliest.

According to his presentation, the so-called ‘ark would cryogenically preserve various species in the event of a global disaster. “We can still save them until the tech advances to then reintroduce these species — in other words, save them for another day,” he said.

The study he co-authored with five other scientists would store the reproductive cells in recently discovered lunar ‘pits’ from which scientists believe lava once flowed billions of years ago. And they think these pits also are the perfect size for cell storage, as they go down 80 to 100 meters underground and ‘provide readymade shelter from the surface of the moon,’ which endures ‘major temperature swings,’ as well as threats from meteorites and space radiation.

In his presentation, he also said that many plants and animals were ‘seriously endangered’ and cited the eruption of Indonesia’s Mount Toba 75,000 years ago, which caused a 1,000-year cooling period. He connected the same to present-day parallel to ‘human activity and other factors that we fully don’t understand.’

However, Thanga’s concept of creating gene banks is not new, it is already being employed at the Svalbard Global Seed Vault on the island of Spitsbergen in the Arctic Sea that houses plant seeds among others at the facility. The unique seed vault currently houses close to 992,000 samples – each containing an average of 500 seeds.