Pollinators like bees are important to biodiversity in their own right, but a study led by Jeremiah Busch, a Washington State University evolutionary biologist, indicates that their decline will also have potentially devastating impacts on plants, and quickly. “If pollinators are lost, it’s not just going to be a problem for the pollinators: plant populations […]
Researchers from the School of the Environment at Washington State University, Vancouver, have developed the first long-term climatology of dry lightning — lightning which occurs with less than 2.5mm of rainfall — in central and northern California, “Unlike human-caused fires that originate in a single location, lightning outbreaks can strike multiple locations and start numerous
With the unprecedented rapid pace of climate change, it is time to start seriously considering the worst-case scenarios warns Washington State University archaeologist Tim Kohler. Kohler is part of an international team of climate experts that argue that although unlikely, climate change catastrophes, including human
In humans and non-humans alike, physical contests are a well documented form of competition when it comes to scarce resources such as food, territory, sex, and power. Humans, however, have developed a more subtle, and now more common, approach: informational warfare. One of its primary manifestations is gossip. While it may not physically batter or […]
A new energy-efficient method developed by a team of WSU scientists to locally produce hydrogen gas from ethanol and water has the potential to make clean hydrogen fuel a more viable alternative to fossil fuels. “Our technology produces pure hydrogen at high pressure with high efficiency and at a low energy cost while also capturing […]
Although opioid use cuts across socio-economic boundaries, WSU researchers have found racial and ethnic minorities in Washington state are more likely to die from an overdose earlier in their lives than non-Hispanic white residents. “This work confirms the epidemic is far reaching and having dramatic impacts on quality and length of life for Americans of […]
Birds of a feather not only flock together but also appear to settle down together. “The presence of another bird that isn’t migratory seems to be a really potent cue to stop migration,” said Heather Watts, a Washington State University behavioral ecologist and corresponding author on a study recently published in Biology Letters. “We saw […]
A team of researchers led by Maria Gartstein, professor of psychology, developed a novel research study using machine learning to attempt to classify infants by gender and age. “It was a cool opportunity to do kind of a demonstration study using techniques that require really large data sets and are not very common in social […]
When she was nine and newly arrived in Washington state, Blanca Blanco (’03 psychology) performed scenes with her sisters in the garage in which they lived. Putting on these “homemade plays,” the self-made starlet writes in her new memoir, “was a way to escape our current life.” Acting, she notes, “gave me a sense of […]
An interdisciplinary study of adolescence-to-adult health found young adults who were at risk of food insecurity had an increased incidence of diabetes 10 years later. WSU researchers in sociology, medicine, and nursing analyzed data on nearly 4,000 people from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health. They found that adults ages 24–32 who […]