While cities provide vital habitat for human beings to thrive, it appears U.S. cities have been built on the most fertile soils, lessening contributions of these lands to Earths food web and human agriculture, according to a study by NASA researchers and others.
Comparing Post-Urban U.S. to Pre-Urban U.S., Difference in Total Annual Net Primary Production
This graphic compares modern U.S. annual Net Primary Production (NPP) to a computer-derived estimate of what the annual NPP would be in the absence of urbanization. The graphic shows areas with reductions or gains in NPP as a result of urban development. NPP measures plant growth by describing the rate at which plants use carbon from the atmosphere to build new organic matter through photosynthesis. Units are in grams of carbon per meter squared. Credit: Marc Imhoff/NASA
U.S. Urbanization and Net Primary Production
a) The top map depicts urbanized areas across the continental U.S. The map was generated from nighttime satellite images from the Defense Meteorological Satellites Operational Linescan System (DMSP/OLS) collected from October 1994 to March 1995. Red indicates urban areas; yellow marks those smaller towns, and suburbs on the peripheries of cities, or peri-urban areas; and black represents non-urban or rural areas. b) The lower map shows simulated total annual NPP for the U.S. at 1x 1km horizontal resolution. Units for NPP are in grams of carbon per square meter. Credit: Marc Imhoff/NASA
Though cities account for just 3 percent of continental U.S. land area, the food and fiber that could be grown there rivals current production on all U.S. agricultural lands, which cover 29 percent of the country. Marc Imhoff, NASA researcher and lead author of a current paper, and co-author Lahouari Bounoua, of NASA and University of Maryland, College Park, added that throughout history humans have settled in areas with the best lands for growing food.
"Urbanization follows agriculture -- its a natural and important human process," said Imhoff.Throughout history, highly productive agricultural land brought food, wealth and trade to an area, all of which fostered settlements.
Krishna Ramanujan | GSFC
Kakao in Monokultur verträgt Trockenheit besser als Kakao in Mischsystemen
18.09.2017 | Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Ultrasound sensors make forage harvesters more reliable
28.08.2017 | Fraunhofer-Institut für Zerstörungsfreie Prüfverfahren IZFP
Using ultrafast flashes of laser and x-ray radiation, scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics (Garching, Germany) took snapshots of the briefest electron motion inside a solid material to date. The electron motion lasted only 750 billionths of the billionth of a second before it fainted, setting a new record of human capability to capture ultrafast processes inside solids!
When x-rays shine onto solid materials or large molecules, an electron is pushed away from its original place near the nucleus of the atom, leaving a hole...
For the first time, physicists have successfully imaged spiral magnetic ordering in a multiferroic material. These materials are considered highly promising candidates for future data storage media. The researchers were able to prove their findings using unique quantum sensors that were developed at Basel University and that can analyze electromagnetic fields on the nanometer scale. The results – obtained by scientists from the University of Basel’s Department of Physics, the Swiss Nanoscience Institute, the University of Montpellier and several laboratories from University Paris-Saclay – were recently published in the journal Nature.
Multiferroics are materials that simultaneously react to electric and magnetic fields. These two properties are rarely found together, and their combined...
MBM ScienceBridge GmbH successfully negotiated a license agreement between University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG) and the biotech company Tissue Systems Holding GmbH about commercial use of a multi-well tissue plate for automated and reliable tissue engineering & drug testing.
MBM ScienceBridge GmbH successfully negotiated a license agreement between University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG) and the biotech company Tissue Systems...
Pathogenic bacteria are becoming resistant to common antibiotics to an ever increasing degree. One of the most difficult germs is Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a...
Scientists from the MPI for Chemical Energy Conversion report in the first issue of the new journal JOULE.
Cell Press has just released the first issue of Joule, a new journal dedicated to sustainable energy research. In this issue James Birrell, Olaf Rüdiger,...
19.09.2017 | Event News
12.09.2017 | Event News
06.09.2017 | Event News
19.09.2017 | Event News
19.09.2017 | Physics and Astronomy
19.09.2017 | Power and Electrical Engineering