When a city is built, habitat and most organisms living in it are killed or forced to flee. Cities use a lot of energy and water and create a tremendous amount of waste and runoff. Development is the biggest source of pollution.

Mr. Rens is the Legal Lead for Creative Commons South Africa, and currently resides in San Francisco where he works on issues around access to knowledge, collaborative creative works and the Digital Divide.

This is a basic introduction to the CNXML language. It includes a description on how to begin a CNXML module and also examples of the basic tags needed to start writing in CNXML.

This course encourages and trains students to think outside the box when addressing water-related problems. Our interdisciplinary approach is designed, for example,to give the health professional an introduction to the engineering components involved in the provision of safe water and sanitation. While at the same time providing the engineer an ecological framework for understanding the place of water in health, it also gives a voice to the ways in which water is involved in social interactions, belief systems, and the economics of an interconnected and interdependent world.

Water quality monitoring activities can support student inquiry into ecological concepts and pollution issues, as well as offer insight into integrating field and lab work. This exercise provides students with practice in identification (to order or family level) of stream macroinvertebrates that they've previously collected. Provided information indicates water pollution tolerance of the various taxa. Students use the data to calculate several different biotic indices for the macroinvertebrates; these are compared to express overall stream water quality. Ideas for possible extensions of this activity are presented.

An animation of Bolivian deforestation from 1984 to 1998 from Landsat imagery

This online book evaluates the current understanding of the linkages among climate, ecosystems, and infectious disease. It outlines the research needed to improve the understanding of these linkages and examines the potential for using climate forecasts and ecological observations to help predict infectious disease outbreaks. The entire book may be read online in HTML or PDF formats, and hard copies may be ordered from the site.

Without the work of decomposers, living organisms would eventually use up all the raw materials in the environment, and dead organisms and wastes would pile up. This video segment from Interactive NOVA: "Earth" describes the role of decomposers as the earth's great recyclers.

Examines health issues, scientific understanding of causes, and possible future approaches to control of the major environmental health problems in industrialized and developing countries. Topics include how the body reacts to environmental pollutants; physical, chemical, and biological agents of environmental contamination; vectors for dissemination (air, water, soil); solid and hazardous waste; susceptible populations; biomarkers and risk analysis; the scientific basis for policy decisions; and emerging global environmental health problems.

This lab is designed to simulate the process of eutrophication over an eight to ten week period. Students use a water-soluble fertilizer (similar to Miracle Grow) to determine the effects of nutrient loads on both terrestrial and aquatic environments. By using three aquariums, Elodea, and radish plants, students can examine the ongoing process of eutrophication by taking weekly measurements of water quality and looking at plant growth. Students become "experts" on such equipment as dissolved oxygen meters, conductivity meters, pH meters, and spectrophotometers. The project culminates in a student and teacher evaluated poster session.

This site examines the history of Earth. Learn about the formation of Earth, dating the age of rocks, geologic time, plate tectonics, climate change, ocean circulation, evolution, extinction, ecology, and topics related to paleobiology.

Global warming has become one of the most pressing issues facing the United States and the world. The following webquest, based on the Koshland Science Museum's exhibit Global Warming: Facts and Our Future, was designed primarily to introduce high school and middle school students to the complicated issues surrounding global warming and climate change. Through participating in a fictitious scenario, students will take an active role in determining how and why climate is changing and how humans may have contributed to these changes. Students become climate scientists, policy analysts, economists, energy experts, and urban planners as they learn about climate science, environmental impacts, policy initiatives, and renewable energy choices. Upon completion of their individual tasks, student teams present their findings and make recommendations that address the situation.

This resource features an award winning, student produced documentary film that fulfills the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's obligations for the National Historic Preservation Act. Users can download movies or short movie clips that describe the first studies of the fur seal in the Pribilofs by Henry Wood Elliot, including historical, environmental, and economic policies that may have saved the seal from extinction.

Students follow weather forecasts to gauge their accuracy and produce a weather report for the class. They develop skills of observation, recording and reporting.

In this video segment adapted from the National Film Board of Canada, learn how the Inuit people have used their traditional knowledge to understand and adapt to changes in their Arctic environment, particularly when hunting and navigating the landscape.

The goal of this activity is for students to learn how to tell a story in order to make a complex topic (such as global warming or ozone holes) easier for a reader to grasp. Students realize that the narrative impulse underlies even scientific and technical writing and gain a better understanding of the role of myth as a "science" of imagination that helps us to gain insight into human motivation.

This activity introduces the futuristic concept of the moon as a place people can inhabit. Students brainstorm what people would need to live on the moon and then design a fantastic Moon colony and decide how to power it. Student use the engineering design process, which includes research on various types of energy sources and evaluating which would be best for their moon colony.

A career with NOAA could launch you all over the world, from the warm waters of the Caribbean to the winter wonders of the South Pole. The challenges are endless. Employment in NOAA is a job with a mission. At NOAA, safeguarding the public, protecting natural resources, strengthening the economy. It's all in a day's work. Imagine yourself. Careers in NOAA are as diverse as the line offices that make up the agency. More information can be found on the Office of Workforce Management website.

The National Geographic News page provided up to date shark news stories. Topics include the benefits of sharks for cancer research, swimming with sharks, shark protection and much more. Users can also link to other National Geographic News topics. This page updates news stories everyday.