Results tagged “extinction” from 60 Second Science

The eastern region of the Democratic Republic of Congo, epicenter of what is often called Africa's World War, may soon see peace for the first time in years. More than 20 rebel leaders -- including rogue general Laurent Nkunda, wanted for war crimes -- are signing a cease-fire with DR Congo's government in hopes to quell the violence that has killed 45,000 people per month for the past ten years.

This is good news for DR Congo's mountain gorilla population. Only 700 of the animals are left on earth, mostly in Virunga National Park-- which became a de-facto war zone last year as rebel militias swarmed in.

Continue reading 'Will Congo's peace treaty save the mountain gorillas too?' >

And you thought you were having a crap Friday: 13,000 years ago, a comet may have collided with earth in the Great Lakes region, creating a 1,000-year-long cold spell that wiped out the Clovis culture of humans in North America.

For years, the disappearance of North America's Clovis culture was attributed either to rapid climate change or a sudden uptick in Clovis hunting practices that wiped out the 35 genera of animals they subsisted on. But similar climate changes of the time hadn't resulted in mass extinctions, and the ethnographic record doesn't support such a rapid change in hunting habits among Clovis humans.

Instead, Douglas Kennett and 25 other researchers from the University of Oregon think that a major comet collision triggered the change. The new hypothesis is based on a thin black layer of soil retrieved at over 50 North American sites. This black soil possesses magnetic grains of iridium, thought to have extraterrestrial origins, along with metallic and carbon spherules, as well as melted charcoal, which remained after catastrophic, continent-wide fires swept the land in the comet's wake.

Continue reading 'Comet may have wiped out first Americans in what scientist describes as a 'bad day;' Related: Understatement Award for 2008 goes to scientist' >

Fish populations are plummeting and, for once, it’s not a result of overfishing. In an important new paper in Nature, researchers show that parasitic sea lice from fish farms are causing wild salmon populations to collapse. The problem is so severe that there could be a 99 percent decline in certain wild salmon populations over the next four years, the scientists report.

Continue reading 'One Fish, Two Fish, Sea Lice, No Fish' >

One third of the world's apes, monkeys, lemurs and other primates face extinction. And it's because of our bad habits of chopping down rain forests, the illegal wildlife trade, and commercial bushmeat hunting.

Today, the the World Conservation Union (IUCN) released a grim report for our closest living relatives: Primates in Peril: The World’s 25 Most Endangered Primates—2006–2008.

“You could fit all the surviving members of these 25 species in a single football stadium; that’s how few of them remain on Earth today,” said Russell A. Mittermeier, Chairman of the IUCN.

via BBC