Carol Lee collaborates with University of Montpellier colleagues researching how tiny plankton cope in an ever-saltier Mediterranean sea and a freshwater-infused Baltic one. From the foothills of the French Pyrenees, Camille Parmesan experiments with cutting-edge climate modeling, hoping it may offer clues for future biodiversity conservation.Both biologists have pulled up stakes from previous posts, counting among U.S. scientists who are responding to the Trump administration’s upcoming withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement with their feet.  “I know quite a lot of really top-notch scientists who have just moved to other …

Amid an alarming surge in vaping among teenagers, Congress recently approved an unprecedented measure to curb tobacco and e-cigarette use nationwide, especially among teens.Congress voted to increase the legal age to buy tobacco and vape products from 18 to 21 as part of a major fiscal 2020 spending agreement. First introduced in May by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, and Senator Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat, the “Tobacco-Free Youth Act” has bipartisan support and aims to tackle youth vaping.President Donald Trump had signaled his support of the …

A recent study has revealed an increase in violence against women and children resulting from the conflict in Yemen.   Research by the Sana’a Center for Strategic Studies shows women and girls in Yemen have been affected by rape, kidnapping and domestic violence, while boys face sexual violence and are forced to work.    Yemen’s nearly five-year conflict is having disastrous consequences on its civilian population, according to the recent study, “A Gendered Crisis: Understanding Experiences of Yemen’s War.”   The qualitative research involving some 90 focus group discussions across Yemen’s …

Chinese experts are investigating an outbreak of respiratory illness in the central city of Wuhan that some have likened to the 2002-2003 SARS epidemic.The city’s health commission said in a statement Tuesday that 27 people had fallen ill with a strain of viral pneumonia, seven of whom were in serious condition.It said most had visited a seafood market in the sprawling city, apparently pointing to a common origin of the outbreak.Unverified information online said the illnesses were caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which emerged from southern China and killed …

Chancellor Angela Merkel is telling Germans in her New Year message that “everything humanly possible” must be done to tackle climate change.Merkel said that there is good reason to be confident about the 2020s in her annual televised message, the text of which was released ahead of its broadcast Tuesday. But she pointed to challenges such as the effect of digitization on people’s jobs and, above all, climate change.”The warming of our Earth is real. It is threatening. It and the crises arising from global warming were caused by humans,” …