China will protect more nature

Gretchen Daily, biology professor at Stanford University, who received the award in 2012, has helped China to identify places of high ecological importance to establish a series of protected areas. Daily’s research, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, used eco-mapping software to identify places of high ecological importance for the country.

“It’s a historic moment in the evolution of Chinese civilization. It’s marked by a recognition that the singular focus on mainstream economic growth over the last century has come at a tremendous cost,” said Gretchen Daily to Stanford News.

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Ozone layer on the mend

Susan Solomon, a prize laureate in 2009, has published a study in Science that confirms the effectiveness of the chemical ban on CFCs; the void in the ozone layer over Antarctica is shrinking.

“It´s a big surprise”, says Solomon, an atmospheric chemist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. “I didn´t think it would be this early”.

Using a combination of measurements from satellites, ground-based instruments, and weather balloons Susan Solomon and her team found that, since 2000, the ozone hole has shrunk by 4 million square kilometers.

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