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A giant seaweed bloom – so large it can be seen from outer space – may be headed towards Florida’s Gulf Coast. The sargassum bloom, at around 5,000 miles wide, is twice the width of the United States and is believed to be the largest in history.

Immunotherapies have improved outcomes of many patients with cancer, including melanoma. But these therapies work for only a subset of patients. Numerous studies are looking at improving responses, including research focusing on enhancing tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs). TILs are immune cells in tumors that can recognize and attack the cancer cells but often there aren't enough of them or they're unable to harness a strong enough response to durably suppress tumor growth and spread. Researchers, led by Eric Lau, Ph.D., have identified a relatively natural way to increase the numbers and antitumor activities of TILs. Lau's team demonstrates how L-fucose, a...

Don’t call it a pivot, exactly — but it’s a fascinating journey, nonetheless. Umaro Foods, which is set to release a seaweed-based bacon replacement, entered the world as Trophic. The firm, which is now technically a subsidiary of the former, was formed to compete for the $100 million Carbon Removal XPrize. The organization managed to land a $5 million prize, due in part to research Beth Zotter had begun in 2010. This part of the story is familiar at least: With no clear commercial path forward, the firm had to rethink things. Given the the generally horrifying trajectory the planet...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Satellites have detected methane emissions from belching cows at a California feedlot, marking the first time emissions from livestock - a major component of agricultural methane - could be measured from space. Environmental data firm GHGSat this month analyzed data from its satellites and pinpointed the methane source from a feedlot in the agricultural Joaquin Valley near Bakersfield, California in February. This is significant, according to GHGSat, because agricultural methane emissions are hard to measure and accurate measurement is needed to set enforceable reduction targets for the beef-production industry. GHGSat said the amount of methane it detected...

Cattle for milk and meat production are responsible for about 9% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Methane — a gas about 25 times more climate-damaging than CO2 but which breaks down after just a decade — is spewed into the atmosphere in large quantities each time the 1 billion cows on the planet burp and fart. And while scientists have shown that eating less meat is a necessary step to greening the farming sector — particularly in industrialized countries, where the average person eats three times as much as in poorer ones — world leaders have mostly avoided policies to...

Cow burps are apparently the source of a lot of methane in our atmosphere. And there are a lot of cows on Earth. But a new research mission suggests a great way to reduce those emissions and significantly lower methane, which causes warming on our planet, and its straight from the sea. As reported by the Guardian, adding seaweed to beef cow diets can lower methane by as much as 82%. “We now have sound evidence that seaweed in cattle diet is effective at reducing greenhouse gases and that the efficacy does not diminish over time,” said agricultural scientist Ermias...

One potential alternative food source – both for humans and the animals we eat – is algae. Humans have eaten macroalgae, like wakame and nori seaweed, for thousands of years. But recently attention has turned to the nutritional and environmental potential of their microscopic cousins. Microalgae are tiny protein-rich organisms found in both fresh and seawater. They typically contain essential amino acids, essential fatty acids, including omega-3, omega-6 along with omega-7, along with vitamins, such as A, D and E. The nutritional content varies depending on the type of microalgae, but two currently dominate the market for human consumption. The...

Edible cups made from seaweed. Shopping bags from cassava starch. Food containers from sugarcane fiber. These are some of the bioplastic alternatives being tried out in Indonesia, the world’s No. 2 producer of seaweed.It’s just after sunrise here in Bali, and a group of locals are preparing to sail their wooden boats out to a bay off Nusa Lembongan, a small island southeast of the tourism hotspot. They’re neither fishermen nor tour guides. They’re farmers, cultivating a watery crop that promises to be part of the solution to the increasingly urgent problem of marine plastic waste that’s become woven into...

Michael Graham reaches into a bright blue tub of bubbling water and pulls out a handful of a dark brown curly substance. It’s slippery to the touch, smells like the sea, and tastes a bit like salty kale. It’s live seaweed, and Graham – a kelp biologist and the creator of Monterey Bay Seaweeds – has been farming the stuff on a small scale in these big tanks in Moss Landing on the central coast of California for close to two years. Using more than a dozen of these big tubs and a couple of larger tanks, he produces between...

I posted this so you could share that moment of discovery - there is no real point in asking me about performance characteristics regarding this cell as it is quite literally 1 day old - so i have no idea. - Robert Murray-Smith.

“We are the only species that exhibit disgust in this way,” Mike Gibney, professor emeritus of food and health at University College Dublin (UCD), says about the odds of western consumers eating less-traditional protein sources through this resource-strained century. While our energy needs are largely served by carbohydrates, without protein, there would no growth, maintenance or repair of our body tissue. And, in the coming years, a global shift from resource-intensive, animal-sourced proteins to more sustainable marine and plant-based sources is on the cards, both for our health and that of the planet. But could seaweed and protein-packed insects prove...

Images: Pamela Patrick MAMMOTH HUNTER OR FISH CATCHER? Archaeologists had concluded that the first inhabitants of the New World were fur-clad big-game hunters who swept across the Bering land bridge in pursuit of their prey. But recent evidence suggests that the first settlers may have been just as likely to hunt small game, catch fish or gather plants as they moved through more temperate environments. The leaf-shaped spearpoint I'm holding is surprisingly dainty--for a deadly weapon. I let my mind wander, trying to imagine life some 14,700 years ago in the marshes of southern Chile, where this relic was ...

Ancient People Followed 'Kelp Highway' to America, Researcher Says Bjorn Carey LiveScience Staff Writer Sun Feb 19, 9:00 PM ET ST. LOUIS—Ancient humans from Asia may have entered the Americas following an ocean highway made of dense kelp. The new finding lends strength to the "coastal migration theory," whereby early maritime populations boated from one island to another, hunting the bountiful amounts of sea creatures that live in kelp forests. This research was presented here Sunday at the annual American Association for the Advancement of Science by anthropologist Jon Erlandson of the University of Oregon. Today, a nearly continuous "kelp...

Recent scientific findings date their arrival earlier than ever thought, sparking hot debate among archaeologists For much of its length, the slow-moving Aucilla River in northern Florida flows underground, tunneling through bedrock limestone. But here and there it surfaces, and preserved in those inky ponds lie secrets of the first Americans.For years adventurous divers had hunted fossils and artifacts in the sinkholes of the Aucilla about an hour east of Tallahassee. They found stone arrowheads and the bones of extinct mammals such as mammoth, mastodon and the American ice age horse.Then, in the 1980s, archaeologists from the Florida Museum of...

Mapmakers once thought the earth was flat. Astronomers used to believe the sun circled the earth. As late as the 1990s, archaeologists were convinced that the original American settlers crossed a land bridge from Asia into Alaska, found daylight between the glaciers, and gradually followed it south. According to what had been orthodox thinking, that happened about 12,000 years ago. “Suppose it were true,” says Jack Rossen, associate professor and chair of the Department of anthropology. “Suppose you could find a corridor through a mile-high wall of ice and follow it for a thousand miles. What would you eat? Popsicles?”...

Dulse seaweed: a new variety, when cooked, reportedly tastes like bacon ============================================================================================= The world's most perfect food may have just arrived! Researchers from Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center say they’ve created and patented a new type of seaweed that has the potential to be sold commercially as the next big superfood. The reason? It tastes just like bacon, they claim. The bizarre but tasty creation is actually a new strain of red marine algae called dulse that is packed full of minerals and protein and looks like red lettuce. Dulse normally grows in the wild along the Pacific...

What grows quickly, is packed with protein, has twice the nutritional value of kale and tastes like bacon? The answer, according to scientists at Oregon State University, is a new strain of seaweed they recently patented. Dulse is a form of edible seaweed that grows wild along the Pacific and Atlantic coastlines. It’s harvested and commonly used by people in dried form as a cooking ingredient or nutritional supplement. But OSU researchers say the variety they’ve developed can be farmed and eaten fresh, with the potential for a new industry for Oregon. …

A succulent red seaweed has been created that is packed full of protein, but unlike any other 'superfood' proclaimed as the world's next culinary saviour, you might actually want to eat this one. And that's because it tastes just like bacon. The new strain of dulse is a variation of a seaweed that grows in the wild along Pacific and Atlantic coastlines and is sold in dried form as a nutritional supplement. Researcher Chris Langdon and colleagues at Oregon State University's (OSU) Hatfield Marine Science Center patented the new strain of seaweed after working on for the past 15 years....

Seaweed. Red algae. The ocean’s harvest also known as carrageenan. Some folks, however, would rather not see the seaweed come ashore. We use carrageenan for coughs, bronchitis, tuberculosis, and intestinal problems. It’s also used as a thickening agent, for weight loss, and for pain reduction and inflammation. It’s in toothpaste and mouthwash. And you’ll find it in dairy products, like milk and ice cream. Heck, it’s even in the food you feed your furry friends, your pets. So, what’s all the fuss? On one side you have the food police saying carrageenan may cause severe stomach and intestinal problem. On...

A Canadian high school student named Bronwyn Delacruz never imagined that her school science project would make headlines all over the world. But that is precisely what has happened. Using a $600 Geiger counter purchased by her father, Delacruz measured seafood bought at local grocery stores for radioactive contamination. What she discovered was absolutely stunning. Much of the seafood, particularly the products that were made in China, tested very high for radiation. So is this being caused by nuclear radiation from Fukushima? Is the seafood that we are eating going to give us cancer and other diseases? The American people...