Curio Cabinet

It's Flashback Friday! In honor of International Orangutan Day, enjoy these curios about endangered animals and plants. Things are going swimmingly for these lucky tuna. Last year, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) released their updated Red List of Threatened Species which showed significant improvements in the population of some of the most commonly fished tuna species. The four affected species are: the Atlantic bluefin (Thunnus thynnus), moved from Endangered to Least Concern; the Southern bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii), moved from Critically Endangered to Endangered; the albacore (Thunnus maccoyii) and yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares), moved from Near Threatened to Least Concern.
For reference, the Red List categorizes every species of interest as Least Concern, Near Threatened, Vulnerable, Endangered, Critically Endangered, Extinct in the Wild and Extinct. If their population has not been adequately studied or not enough information is available, they are labeled Not Evaluated or Data Deficient, respectively.
 
The IUCN credits the recovery of these fish to “countries enforcing more sustainable fishing quotas and successfully combating illegal fishing.” Budget conscious seafood lovers might be particularly relieved by the news regarding the albacore and the yellowfin, some of the most ubiquitous tunas on store shelves. They’ll be sharing their Least Concerned status with the skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis), meaning that they are now considered “sustainably caught and managed,” according to Craig Hilton-Taylor, head of the IUCN Red List Unit.
 
However, the IUCN also emphasizes that “many regional tuna stocks remain severely depleted.” For example, the Atlantic bluefin population in the Gulf of Mexico has continued to decline in recent decades, and the yellowfin are still being overfished in the Indian Ocean. Additionally, based on newly available stock assessment data, the Pacific bluefin (Thunnus orientalis) was moved from Vulnerable to Near Threatened, being “severely depleted at less than 5% of its original biomass,” according to the IUCN. Nevertheless, Dr. Bruce B. Collette, Chair of the IUCN SSC Tuna and Billfish Specialist Group, said in a recent statement, “These Red List assessments are proof that sustainable fisheries approaches work, with enormous long-term benefits for livelihoods and biodiversity.” That’s good news for both diners and nature lovers.

 
[Image description: A group of Atlantic bluefin tuna swim in blue waters.] Credit & copyright: Danilo Cedrone (United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization)/Public Domain

It's Flashback Friday! In honor of International Orangutan Day, enjoy these curios about endangered animals and plants. Move over Dolly, there's a new clone in town—and she's here to save a species! Born December 10th, Elizabeth Ann is a black-footed ferret unlike any other. Created from the genetic material a ferret named Willa who died more than 30 years ago, Elizabeth Ann is the first clone of a U.S. endangered species in history. Elizabeth Ann was created in a joint effort between five conservation and technology organizations. First, researchers extracted genetic material from Willa, who was frozen upon her death in 1988. They then transferred it into an egg cell which had had its own genetic material removed. The egg was implanted into the uterus of a domestic ferret, which gave birth to Elizabeth Ann. The process took seven years. As lead researcher Pete Gober remarked in an interview with CBS, "It takes extraordinary efforts to put humpty dumpty back together once you let him fall off the wall and get cracked." The "humpty-dumpty" Gober referred to is the black-footed ferret species, which used to roam throughout central North America.
 

Due to human encroachment, much of the prairie dog population, which black-footed ferrets depend on for survival, was wiped out. Today, only around 350 black-footed ferrets survive in the wild. All naturally-born black-footed ferrets alive today share the same seven ancestors. Such close inbreeding causes homozygosity, a state in which offspring are disproportionately affected by harmful recessive traits that would normally be selected out of the gene pool. Elizabeth Ann's genetic material would introduce much-needed genetic diversity to the species.
Researchers are now theorizing that cloning could be key to saving other endangered species, or even bringing back extinct ones, such as passenger pigeons or even wooly mammoths. To think such big things might be possible thanks to one little ferret!
 

[Image description: Elizabeth Ann, a cloned back-footed ferret, pokes her head out of a tube. Her fur is light brown and white with a dark brown stripe across her eye-area.] Credit & copyright: CNN
 

These fuel cells are getting a boost. Researchers at the University of Technology Sydney have found a way to make hydrogen fuel cells more viable for storing green energy, according to a paper published in Nature. Currently, hydrogen energy storage cells convert excess power from green energy sources into hydrogen gas. The gas can then be used as clean fuel. The trouble is, hydrogen is a tricky gas to store and takes up a lot of space. It seems more ideal to use a solid form of storage like metal hydrides, materials containing metal or metalloid bonded to hydrogen. Hydrides are compact and safe to handle. They can also hold on to hydrogen for long periods of time, and when needed, it can be extracted as a gas or as a form of thermal or electric energy. It’s a low-cost, low emission way to make use of surplus energy produced by renewable sources…the problem is that metal hydrides have very low thermal conductivity, meaning that they take a long time to charge and discharge the stored energy. Now, researchers have overcome those limitations by fiddling around with the internal heat exchangers of magnesium-based metal hydride energy storage devices. According to Puchanee Larpruenrudee, the first author of the study, the team tried different shapes for the heat exchanger, including helical coils and fins. However, a semi-cylindrical coil shape provided the best heat and mass transfer, resulting in a charging time that was 59 percent faster than with traditional heat exchangers. The research team hopes to continue developing the technology, and have also set their sights on increasing the hydrogen desorption rate. Sounds like a gas!

[Image description: a digital illustration of blue hydrogen molecules.] Credit & copyright: geralt, Pixabay
 

Ever feel like the days are getting shorter? Well, it’s not just in your head. Scientists have found that the Earth is spinning faster, resulting in shorter days. Back on June 29, Earth experienced the shortest day ever on record, with the planet completing a rotation 1.59 milliseconds ahead of the 24-hour schedule. Less than a month later, on July 26, it came close to breaking that record when the day ended 1.5 milliseconds sooner than it should have. So, what’s the deal? Is the planet just going to keep spinning faster and faster until every day is just a few hours long? Don’t worry, there’s no looming catastrophe. In fact, these fluctuations are apparently part of a cycle that scientists are just beginning to understand. If anything, days are getting longer overall, but it’s not on a timescale that’s meaningful to humans. The day actually gets longer by an average of 1.8 milliseconds every century, but even at that rate, it takes hundreds of millions of years to get an extra hour. In the short term, the length of the day fluctuates ever so slightly, although the cause isn’t clear.
 
There could be a number of contributing factors, like earthquakes shifting the Earth’s axis, melting glaciers moving the planet’s mass away from the poles or—the most likely culprit—a phenomenon called the Chandler Wobble, in which the planet’s geographical poles move across its surface. It’s unlikely for anyone to notice the difference in the length of the day without specialized equipment, but it can affect some things that many people use every day. Anyone with a watch or clock that synchronizes with an atomic clock might find their devices showing the wrong time after a while, and GPS devices, which also rely on satellites that sync with atomic clocks, could be rendered useless. Fortunately, the solution is relatively simple. Timekeeping organizations need only add a “drop second” to compensate for the shorter days, much like leap days are used to keep the calendar consistent. Count on humans to always keep our numbers straight.

 
[Image description: A photo taken from space, showing the sun over Earth’s horizon] Credit & copyright: qimono, Pixabay

Roads may be congested, but there’s plenty of room under them. Switzerland is starting work on the Cargo Sous Terrain (CST), an underground cargo-delivery system set to be operational by 2031. The plan is to start with a 43-mile length of tunnels with 10 stops along the way, with two lanes of automated traffic. While similarities have been drawn to hyperloop projects by Hyperloop-TT and Virgin Hyperloop, the CST’s main focus will be to transport freight, not passengers. As such, the CST won’t have to make engineering choices based on comfort and appearance, which would add to the cost of the enormous project. Fortunately for Swiss citizens, the government isn’t planning on using taxpayer backed subsidies to build the CST. Instead, a number of private companies like Credit Suisse, Swiss Railways Cargo and supermarket chains will be backing the project. By 2031, they hope to have the first portion of the CST completed for about $3.7 billion. That will be just a fraction of the total bill, which might get up to $35 billion for another 311 miles of tunnels by 2045.
 
Looking at the plans, it’s not hard to see why it will be so expensive. The tunnels are set to be around 20 feet wide and over 300 feet underground in some areas. Inside, the cargo will be transported in a vacuum to reduce drag, allowing individual pods carrying one or two pallets of goods to reach speeds of up to 760 MPH. In addition to being autonomous, the entire system is also set to create zero emissions by running entirely on renewable energy. Still, it seems like a lot of trouble to go through just to move cargo, so why bother? Well, Switzerland is already projected to see an increase of 40 percent in traffic volume in the next 30 years. Aside from the additional carbon emissions, that means there will be less room on the surface for trucks and other cargo vehicles. Sometimes you’ve got to dig down to move forward.

 
[Image description: A highway tunnel.] Credit & copyright: MPMPix, Pixabay