Our endlessly creative and provocative Cornell colleague Thomas Gold passed away on 22 June at age 84. Tommy pioneered thinking about abiogenic methane and the deep hot biosphere. He opened our eyes in the late 1970s to the possibility that the popular beliefs about the origins of “fossil fuels”, and their abundance and distribution, might be ripe for scientific revolution. The 14 September New York Times reports a new PNAS article providing strong evidence for Tommy’s view. A memorial service is planned for Tommy in Ithaca on 13 October.
News
Welcome back, Iddo!
We are delighted to welcome back Iddo Wernick as a part time Research Investigator this Fall with PHE!
Updated ‘Top 10 Reasons’ brochure available
Mark Stoeckle, Paul Waggoner, and Jesse Ausubel have prepared a
2-page brochure about ten reasons for DNA barcoding of species. (Newly revised September 18, 2004)
28 Aug 2004 NYT article
An article in the Sunday 28 August 2004 New York Times Week in Review refers to our view that 2-3% annual rates of progress might restore nature. Support for our view is found in our ImPACT Identity studies.
Tony Barrett Leaves for Carnegie Mellon
After a productive stay, our Research Intern, Tony Barrett departed for Pittsburgh, PA to begin his doctorate in Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University. He can still be reached at the Program for the Human Environment at his Rockefeller University email (barrett@mail.rockefeller.edu) and will continue to collaborate with us on projects.
29 July 2004
Upon submission for publication of our paper on “Industrial Ecology for Leverage to Loose Less Cadmium,” we post our simulator of cadmium flows to our ImPACT identity site. The “DynaCad” simulator provides the basis for key conclusions in the paper. We thank Paul Waggoner for his lead role in creating the simulator and Iddo Wernick, Peter Elias,
and Tony Barrett for their patience in completing this work, which grew out of our 1997 report Industrial Ecology: Some Directions for Research.
2 July 2004
Jesse returned today from the Azores where the international Scientific Steering Committee for the Census of Marine Life met and welcomed to port the MS Loran and G. O. Sars, which had completed the first leg of the survey of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. For the thrilling daily cruise diary of the expedition, visit: https://www.mar-eco.no/Shiptoshore/g._o._sars
10 Reasons for DNA barcoding
Mark Stoeckle, Paul Waggoner, and Jesse have prepared a 2-page brochure about ten reasons for DNA barcoding of species.
https://phe.rockefeller.edu/BarcodeConference/docs/TenReasonsBarcoding.pdf
Jesse at Millennium Technology Prize symposium
On 22 June Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, received the first Millennium Technology Prize [www.technologyawards.org] (1 million Euros) in Helsinki. Jesse was one of the speakers at the accompanying symposium. His remarks on Big Green Energy Machines were reported in the main Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat [part 1, [part 2]. We thank Pekka Kauppi for a translation to English. The Suomen Kuvalehti (“Newsweek in Finland”) also ran a story that highlights both ZEPPs and the Continental Supergrid [part 1, part 2].
Big Green Energy Machines: Text (pdf), and Slides (powerpoint)
29 June 2004
Sir John Browne, Chairman and CEO of BP, spoke on the record at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York on Thursday 24 June about global warming “Beyond Kyoto.” Jesse moderated the meeting. Mr. Browne’s remarks are notable for accepting a limit or threshold for warming of 2.0 centigrade and for atmospheric concentration of 500-550 parts per million. Mr. Browne’s remarks are at