How will global warming affect El Niño in the 21st Century?

India Science Wire El Niño remains the largest climate phenomenon that appears frequently producing droughts, floods, wildfires, dust and snow storms, fish kill, and even elevated risks of civil conflicts. The theater of action for El Niño is the tropical Pacific Ocean but its global reach costs the global community tens of billions dollars each time.   El Niño’s occur every two-to-seven years with very strong El Niño’s occurring about every 15 years. How the frequency or the time between two events and strength will change because of global warming…

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Biodegradable film developed from whey, isabgol and lotus stem starch

India Science Wire Indian researchers have developed a biodegradable film using lotus stem starch, whey protein concentrate, and psyllium husk that has high structural integrity and low solubility. Starch can form continuous matrix and has been considered an important polymer due to low cost and renewability. But films made from starch alone have low-mechanical strength and high water vapour content. In this study, researchers used starch along with whey protein and psyllium husk (isabgol) to make a biodegradable film. The stem of lotus plant was used as a source of…

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India and China are greening faster than rest of the world

Science Wire China and India – two economic powerhouses of Asia – are contributing significantly to the greening of the planet, a new global study released on Monday has found. The world now has about 5.5 million square kilometers of extra green leaf area round the year compared to 2000. A bulk of this increase is due to greening in China and India. China has contributed 25 percent to this increase, while India added 6.8 percent of the total global net increase in leaf area between 2000 and 2017. The…

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