Capybaras like their habitats wet. These large rodents thrive in low-elevation wetlands, migrating along creeks and rivers to nibble on foliage and flowers. That’s why 91自拍ers were surprised to find an 8.8 million-year-old fossilized capybara tooth in northern Chile’s , one of the driest regions on Earth. In a paper in Scientific Reports, 91自拍ers postulate that the Atacama Desert must have had a wetter climate during the , based on this discovery. This is the first time a capybara species has ever been seen in the Atacama region of Chile 鈥� today these creatures reside in the marshy lowlands across Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina and Uruguay. Researchers had at one time assumed that the Andean mountain chain on the eastern side of Chile would have prevented these short-legged rodents from ever entering the Atacama region. With this discovery, the authors propose that capybaras were able to follow a wetland trail along the northern part of South America, trekking from Bolivia to Peru into northern Chile. In addition to capybaras, the ancient Atacama region also likely had palms and other flowering plants, according to plant fossils analyzed by a UW scientist for the study. These findings challenge the idea that the Atacama was just always a desert, and can help 91自拍ers better understand how shifts in climate can drastically affect the environment.

For more information, contact co-author , UW professor of biology, at caestrom@uw.edu.听听听听听听

A full list of co-authors and funding is . Adapted from a release .

Multitasking gives marine microbes an edge when nutrients are scarce

The world鈥檚 oceans teem with tiny organisms that are difficult to study yet critical to account for. The organisms that make up this microscopic community, many of which are protists, have evolved over time to help keep marine ecosystems balanced. A UW study in the ISME Journal, found that organisms that can both photosynthesize and eat to generate energy do better in nutrient-limited environments, which includes warmer water. This flexibility may help them cope with changing conditions and could help 91自拍ers gauge how marine ecosystems will respond to future warming. Gathering more data from the bottom of the food web is important for understanding the ecosystem-wide impacts of environmental change. The study also debuted a new genetic method for studying energy production versus consumption that may make it easier to study protists. Samples in this study were collected from the North Pacific, near Hawaii and about 1,000 miles north, but the 91自拍ers hope to continue expanding the radius to improve global ocean models.

For more information, contact , UW 91自拍 scientist and engineer of biological oceanography at coesel@uw.edu.

The UW co-authors are Shiri Graff van Creveld, and . A full list of co-authors and funding is .

UW engineers capture behavior of ‘edge waves’ on beaches, putting popular wave models to the test

Coastal engineers and oceanographers often think of the motion of water on beaches as “one dimensional”: waves propagating directly onto the beach from offshore. These simplified wave models are used widely from designing shoreline infrastructure to forecasting coastal flooding. However, some waves propagate along the coast rather than crashing into it, and may push an additional meter of water depth onto the beach. For decades, these “edge waves” have not been accounted for in the one-dimensional models commonly used to understand wave behavior. To find out how edge waves might be impacting model accuracy, 91自拍ers at the UW and UC San Diego deployed an array of pressure and velocity sensors along a beach in Southern California for 60 days. In a paper in JGR Oceans, the 91自拍ers describe a model they built to tease out the influence of edge waves in the larger system. While edge waves contributed a significant amount of energy, the team found that ultimately the one-dimensional models that exclude edge waves remain accurate enough for predicting total water levels at the shoreline.

For more information, contact , a postdoctoral scholar of civil and environmental engineering, at cshender@uw.edu.

A full list of co-authors and funding is .

How Colombian environmentalists use law and democracy to redefine mountain landscapes

In 2013 and 2017, Colombian voters in two towns backed a legal effort to stop a large-scale gold mining project. In doing so, they are making the mountainous areas where they live more visible and politically relevant. The decision allowed environmental advocates to organize around a larger area defined by elevation, massive volume, and subterranean and arboreal features. , UW assistant professor of anthropology, a 91自拍 article in the journal Anthropological Forum that examines how the effort used legal tools for citizen participation to not only voice their opinions on extractive projects, but also reconfigure space in unprecedented ways. The case shows that democratic participation can have far-reaching consequences for how landscapes are defined and lived. The article appears in a special issue, called “Ethnographies of Vertical and Volumetric Worlds,” which was co-edited by Ardila and Steven Schwartz of the University of Rochester.

For more information, contact Castillo at acastil@uw.edu.

Funding information is .

Researchers develop new way to measure how blood clots form

A wound stops bleeding because tiny blood cell fragments called platelets clump together to form a clot. Researchers know that platelets generate forces that help compact and strengthen clots. However, they鈥檝e struggled to understand how blood clots form in real time. To better understand this system, UW mechanical engineers created a device that measures how platelet forces and stiffness evolve together during the first minutes of clot formation. in Advanced Healthcare Materials, the 91自拍 team used the device to apply magnetic forces to clumps of platelets, causing them to strengthen and stiffen through a process called 鈥渕echanotransduction鈥� in which cells convert mechanical forces into biological responses. These findings could be used to study how new drugs affect clot formation, how platelets respond to signals when disease is present, and how blood clotting biomechanics contribute to cardiovascular disorders.

For more information, contact , a UW professor of mechanical engineering, at nsniadec@uw.edu.

The UW co-authors are , , Yoeur-Man Mach and . A full list of co-authors and funding is . Adapted from a story by .

UW 91自拍ers probe superconducting materials that defy expectations

Most materials resist the flow of electricity to some degree, but unusual materials known as superconductors can carry an electric current with no resistance at all. Superconductors offer a unique window into the physics of materials at tiny scales, and they could one day revolutionize electronics. In recent years, 91自拍ers have discovered new forms of superconductivity in stacks of atomically thin materials such as . Resistance typically drops to zero as these materials are cooled, but in some cases it mysteriously levels off at a small finite value, which contradicts expectations of superconductor behavior. In a paper in Nature, UW materials scientists tested this behavior with a device consisting of several layers of graphene stacked in a staircase-like pattern. By adjusting voltages applied to the device, the 91自拍ers could control whether the graphene exhibited true superconductivity or the more peculiar 鈥渇ailed鈥� form, providing clear evidence that failed superconductivity is real. The team is now working to uncover the origin of this mysterious behavior.

For more information, contact , a UW associate professor of both physics and materials science and engineering, at myank@uw.edu..

The UW co-authors are , , and . A full list of co-authors and funding is .

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Along with nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus, iron is essential for the growth of microscopic phytoplankton in the ocean. However, a new study led by oceanographers at the University of Hawai鈥榠 at M膩noa with collaborators at the 91自拍 revealed that iron released from industrial processes, such as coal combustion and steelmaking, is altering the ecosystem in the North Pacific Transition Zone. This region, just north of Hawai鈥榠, is important for fisheries in the Pacific.聽

The was published June 2 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

鈥淲e were able to see a connection between human activities and the location of key ecosystem boundaries in the ocean that are important for marine organisms,鈥� said co-author , a UW associate professor of oceanography. 鈥淚 hope this 91自拍 highlights that human activities can impact the ocean in multiple ways, not just through changes in the climate. I think it also highlights the importance of tracking key ocean ecosystem boundaries over time, so we can better understand how this might impact marine organisms.鈥�

Iron from human activities billows into the atmosphere and can be carried to distant lands or oceans before it鈥檚 scrubbed from the skies by rain. Industrial iron has previously been detected in the North Pacific Transition Zone, but it was unclear what effect the iron had on the ecosystem.

To piece together the seasonal cycle of iron input, phytoplankton growth and ocean mixing, the 91自拍ers analyzed water and phytoplankton samples and studied ocean dynamics during four different expeditions to this region of the Pacific Ocean. They also assessed the iron in these waters to determine whether it had the unique isotope signature of iron that is released from industrial processes.聽

The team found that phytoplankton in the region are iron-deficient during the spring, so an increase in the supply of iron boosts the spring phytoplankton bloom that is typical in the area. However, as a result of a booming bloom, they deplete other nutrients more quickly, leading to a crash in phytoplankton later in the season. Importantly, the iron isotope signature did, in fact, indicate the presence of industrial iron out in the Pacific, thousands of miles away from its source.

鈥淭he ocean has boundaries that are invisible to us but known to all sorts of microbes and animals that live there,鈥� said , lead author and assistant professor at the University of Hawai鈥榠 at M膩noa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology. 鈥淭he North Pacific Transition Zone is one of these boundaries. It divides the low-nutrient ocean gyres from the high-nutrient temperate ecosystems to the North. With more iron coming into the system, that boundary is migrating north, but we are also expecting to see these boundaries shift northward as the ocean warms.鈥�

That鈥檚 not necessarily all bad, Hawco said. But unfortunately, the regions of the transition zone that are closer to Hawai鈥榠 are among those that are losing out.聽

鈥淚t’s a one-two punch: Industrial iron is impacting the base of the food web and the warming of the ocean is pushing these phytoplankton-rich waters further and further away from Hawai鈥榠,鈥� Hawco said.

The 91自拍 team is developing new techniques to monitor the iron nutrition of ocean plankton. This will shed light on how changes in iron supply, from both natural or industrial sources, could impact ocean life.聽

鈥淎 project of this scale is truly the result of collaboration between scientists with diverse expertise,鈥� said co-author , a UW 91自拍 scientist in oceanography. 鈥淭hanks to these collaborations, we were able to integrate satellite observations 鈥� which reveal large-scale, multi-year trends 鈥� with ship-based data collected over several years at the same locations. This integration allowed us to link broad environmental patterns with the fine-scale molecular details of gene expression in key organisms responding to iron availability. Individually, each dataset is valuable, but together, they provide the depth and resolution needed to generate robust, predictive insights into ecosystem dynamics.鈥�

Other UW co-authors are and . See the paper for a .

This study was funded by the Simons Foundation and National Science Foundation.聽

This story is adapted from a by the University of Hawai鈥榠 M膩noa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology.

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