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Declines in the biodiversity of pollinating insects and wild plants in Britain, Belgium, and the Netherlands have slowed in recent years.

Researchers found evidence of dramatic reductions in the diversity of species ibetween the 1950s and 1980s, but researchers say the picture brightened markedly after 1990, with a slowdown in local and national biodiversity losses among bees, hoverflies, and wild plants.

Scientists report a significant slowing or reversal of the declines for wild plants and their insect pollinators in recent years. “These species are important to us,” says Bill Kunin professor of ecology at the University of Leeds “About a third of our food production, including most of our fruit and vegetables, depends on animal pollination and we know that most crop pollination is done by wild pollinators.”

Full story and additional images at Futurity.

More research news from top universities.

Photo credit: Keith Williamson/Flickr

Sterile gauze and tweezers aren’t going to do the trick when it comes to healing a broken heart, but a tiny bottle of vodka to clean the wound might just do the trick.

Melanie Chernock has the cure for what ails you in Love Hurts, the first aid kit for emotional wounds.

Initially, I knew that I did not want to make a kit of sadness and wanted to approach the product with a sense of humor. Love Hurts contains all of the essentials for going through a rough breakup such as dark chocolate, vodka, bubble bath soap, a candle with matches, candy hearts, a mix CD, and if all else fails, tissues. All of the products come neatly packaged in a compact kit. Unfortunately, the kit is not yet available to purchase. If anyone is interested in producing it, please get in touch!

If listening to the radio for three minutes is any indication, we’re pretty sure this would fly off the shelves.

Full story at Melanie Chernock via Neatorama.

Laughter is the best medicine.

Photo credit: Luke Nilsson

The landscape of Facebook is constantly changing, and that means social media managers can easily be overlooking some great opportunities to boost their business with new features.

Social Media Examiner‘s Mike Gingerich provides an audit guide to make sure your company is still on the cutting edge of this platform.

#1: Maximize Your Page Cover Image

Facebook recently updated its guidelines and loosened the restrictions on what you can display on your main Page cover image. (View updated Facebook Guidelines.) This prime location now lets you display your web address, a call to action and more.

The key is that text cannot exceed 20% of the cover image area.

Facebook now allows creative uses of the timeline cover image.

If designed creatively, cover images now afford Pages a powerful new opportunity tocommunicate key pieces of information to visitors. Make sure to take advantage of this change.

#2: Evaluate Your Profile Image

Your profile image is used whenever you post and it is the first thing users see when glancing through posts in their news feed. Your business should not have a picture of Joe the owner in the profile unless Joe is the brand! Your logo can help reinforce company branding.

Note that your profile image should be uploaded at a size of 180 x 180 pixels; Facebook sizes it down to 160 x 160 pixels.

Key Tip: It’s best to upload a square-designed image.

Full story at Social Media Examiner.

Maximizing Facebook for business.

Photo credit: Fotolia

Being different has always been a risk, but for LGBT youth in the digital age, it’s become deadly.

This infographic by OnlineColleges takes a closer look at the problems facing LGBT youth online as well as the growing support network for those in danger.

Please remember, in the words of the video project of Dan Savage and partner Terry Miller, “It gets better.”

Via OnlineColleges.com.

Seeing the big picture with infographics.

If you enjoyed Ken Cosgrove busting a move on Mad Men, then you’ll love it even more when Daft Punk comes to call in the last century.

We dare you to keep those happy feet still.

Full story at YouTube via Kottke.

Messing with TV.

Worried about someone making off with your hard drive and all those super, secret files the bad guys are dying to get their dirty hands on?

Well, chances are they’ll just hack you and the damage will be done before you have a clue what happened, but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy the show put on by Caleb Kraft as he constructs a self-destruct mechanism out of thermite and lights that baby on fire! *Insert evil laugh here*

Full story at Hack a Day via Boing Boing.

DIY destruction.

USA

Ever stop and look at your grocery cart as though it wasn’t yours?

Would people say you were a healthy eater, a busy person, a late-night snacker?

Photographer  Peter Menzel decided to use a wider lens and focus on what families from different countries consume in a typical week and, as you might guess, pizza figures prominently in the shot from the States.

Italy

Japan

Australia

Full story at Peter Menzel Photography via Fstoppers.

We are what we eat.

Sadly, 25% of businesses fail within their first year and an astonishing 70% of businesses fail within ten years. So, if you’re thinking about starting a business or you’ve recently made the leap, how can you optimize your chances of success? What is the single most important factor in determining your success?

1. Build a strong leadership team

2. Have a great mindset

3. Execute

4. Create value

Most important: focus!

Full article on LinkedIn by Dave Kerpen

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