Source: BBC

With their awkward, lumbering gait, elephants moving at high speed are not the most graceful of animals – but are they walking or running?

Now scientists believe they have an answer: new research confirms that they do both – at the same time.

By observing elephants moving across a hi-tech track, the team found the hefty creatures run with their front legs but walk with their back legs.

Read the rest on BBC News

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A pod of bottlenose dolphins off the coast of Florida have developed a remarkable hunting strategy in order to catch fish. Another awesome thing about this technique is that only one female in the pod can create this ring.

From the first episode (Challenges of Life) of the new BBC series Life. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00lbpcy

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• Action Against Hunger
• American Red Cross
• American Jewish World Service
• AmeriCares
• Beyond Borders
• CARE
• Catholic Relief Services
• Childcare Worldwide
• Direct Relief International
• Doctors Without Borders
• Feed My Starving Children
• Friends of WFP
• Haitian Health Foundation
• Hope for Haiti
• International Medical Corps
• International Relief Teams
• Medical Teams International
• Meds and Food for Kids
• Mercy Corps
• Operation USA
• Oxfam
• Partners in Health
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• Save the Children
• UNICEF
• World Concern
• World Vision
• Yele Haiti
  Wyclef Jean’s grassroots org
  Text Yele to 501 501 to donate $5 via your cellphone

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Tears have several important functions. In all land animals, they clean and lubricate the eyes. And in some places, they are also a source of nutrition. A German scientist has discovered that a moth on the island of Madagascar drinks the tears of sleeping birds.

The moth (Hemiceratoides hieroglyphica) is about 2.5 centimeters (1 inch) long and has a proboscis about half that length. A proboscis is a tubelike structure that moths and butterflies use like a drinking straw to sip nectar and other liquids. The Madagascar moth uses its proboscis to suck tears.

Source: Current Science, a Weekly Reader publication, March 16, 2007

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These photographs of albatross chicks were made just a few weeks ago on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

See the rest

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NASA Earth Image of the Day

NASA Earth Image of the Day

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Golden path.

Ever wander what makes the trees change colour? As if they were magically transformed by Bob Ross?

Leaves process water and carbon dioxide with the help of phontosynthesis. These nutrients are processed into glucose (building block for growth and energy in plants) with the help of chlorophyll. Chlorophyll is what gives leaves their green colour.

As seasons change, the days get shorter and sunlight more rare. Because there are not enough nutrients for the trees in the form of water or sunlight during the colder seasons, they start “shutting down” for the winter by slowing down production of chlorophyll. As chlorophyll fades away, yellow and orange colors (xanthophyl, carotene) start showing.

In trees like maple, glucose is trapped after photosynthesis stops. Glucose in the leaves turns red with colder autumn nights and sunlight. And brown leaves are stained with trapped waste.

Pretty cool.

Photo by Ian Muttoo

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