PLANET IN PERIL

Science Today -  University of Maine Mt. Jarvis, Alaska. Photo by R. McGimsey, U.S. Geological Survey Children in Alaska whose diet includes a lot of fish from rivers fed by the Eastern Alaska Mountain Range may have a long-term elevated risk for cancer because of insecticides -- including DDT -- in the meltwater. Story here. RELATED: " Research Suggests Our Past, Prolific Use Of The Insecticide DDT May Still Be Contributing To A Scourge Of Modern-Day Diseases Related To Obesity.  -  Is a world-wide ban now the only ethical thing to do?"

PHY ORG An aerial shot of mountains in Greenland. 2006. Photo by  Túrelio . Surface melting across Greenland's mile-thick ice sheet began increasing in the mid-19th century and then ramped up dramatically during the 20th and early 21st centuries, showing no signs of abating, according to… More here.

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PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY B An Oxfam photo. Humans have dramatically altered the planet over the course of a century, from the acidity of our oceans to the fragmentation of our landscapes and the temperature of our climate. More here.

ScienceNews Hoar frost coats trees of the boreal forest in Manitoba, Canada.  A PinP photo. Researchers conducting a 5-year-long study examining snow cover in a northern hardwood forest region found that projected changes in climate could lead to a 95 percent reduction of deep-insulating snowpack in forest areas across the northeastern United States by the end of the 21st century. The loss of snowpack would likely result in a steep reduction of forests' ability to store climate-changing carbon dioxide and filter pollutants from the air and water. Story here.

Laurier Canada’s race to meet biodiversity conservation targets could jeopardize the very goal it is trying to achieve.  More here. Aerial view of the Bunsby marine park. West coast of Vancouver Island. Bc. Photo by  Kiwican

by Larry Powell It's a terrible ailment called  chronic wasting disease (CWD). A moose in Riding Mountain National Park, Canada. A PinP photo. Canada's Food Inspection Agency describes it as "a progressive, fatal disease of the nervous system of cervids (deer, elk and moose)." It is blamed on a prion , or abnormal protein, which is also linked to mad cow  disease in cattle, scrapie in sheep and CJD in humans. But CWD is the only disease in this group which spreads through the environment. It's been common in North America for years and, to a lesser degree, south Korea. Here in Canada, it has long been ravaging free-roaming animals in Saskatchewan and Alberta. More recently, it has been detected on a farm which raises red deer in Quebec and even among domesticated reindeer in northern Europe. Up 'til now, at least, some experts have considered CWD pretty much unstoppable. But a new study by a team of four researchers at the U

PHYS ORG  A few weeks ago, AFP joined news outlets around the world in covering the release of a major academic paper, warning that our oceans were warming dramatically faster than previously thought. There was one problem. It was wrong. Read more  here.  Atlantic herring (Clupea harengus) are small schooling fish that can be found on both sides of the North Atlantic. A NOAA photo.