Image: The American pika lives in rocky mountain areas and boulder-covered hillsides. In recent years, it  has been retreating to higher elevations. Since the 1990s, some pika populations along the species’ southernmost ranges have vanished. Credit Science Source

nytimes.com - April 30th 2015 - Carl Zimmer

Climate change could drive to extinction as many as one in six animal and plant species, according to a new analysis.

In a study published Thursday in the journal Science, Mark Urban, an ecologist at the University of Connecticut, also found that as the planet warms in the future, species will disappear at an accelerating rate.

“We have the choice,” he said in an interview. “The world can decide where on that curve they want the future Earth to be.”

USA TODAY  by Alison Young                                 March 6, 2015

More than 175 monkeys that were potentially exposed to a bioterror bacteria inside a major Louisiana research complex were returned to their outdoor cages before officials knew the deadly pathogen was on the loose from a lab accident.

The new admission by the Tulane National Primate Research Center, in response to repeated questions from USA TODAY, raises further questions about contamination of the environment outside of the massive research campus north of New Orleans. The bacteria, which is not found in the United States and can cause severe disease in people and animals, can live and grow in soil and water.

"Some animals were released from the vet clinic early on, but the key thing is that all the animals have been traced," said Tulane spokesman Michael Strecker. Testing of the animals is ongoing to determine if they have been exposed to the bacterium, Burkholderia pseudomallei.

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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/03/05/at-risk-monkeys-released-from-tulane-hospital/24471615/

Image:  Rubbish dumped on the tundra outside llulissat in Greenland stand in stark contrast to icebergs behind from the Sermeq Kujullaq or llulissat Ice fjord – a Unesco world heritage site. Photograph: Global Warming Images/WWF-Canon

theguardian.com - September 29th, 2014 - Damian Carrington

The number of wild animals on Earth has halved in the past 40 years, according to a new analysis. Creatures across land, rivers and the seas are being decimated as humans kill them for food in unsustainable numbers, while polluting or destroying their habitats, the research by scientists at WWF and the Zoological Society of London found.

A lemon damselfish finding shelter in coral. Exposure to CO2 will make it more adventurous, and endanger its life. Photograph: Bates Littlehales/Corbis

theguardian.com - by Oliver Milman - April 13, 2014

Escalating carbon dioxide emissions will cause fish to lose their fear of predators, potentially damaging the entire marine food chain, joint Australian and US research has found.

A study by the Australian Institute of Marine Science, James Cook University and the Georgia Institute of Technology found the behavior of fish would be “seriously affected” by greater exposure to CO2.

Researchers studied the behavior of coral reef fish at naturally occurring CO2 vents in Milne Bay, in eastern Papua New Guinea.

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CLICK HERE - STUDY - Behavioural impairment in reef fishes caused by ocean acidification at CO2 seeps

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