About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the benefit of humanity.
Aug 14, 2016...
The varied and vibrant food market in Cascais, Portugal. (photo credit:AYA MASSIAS)
Weizmann Institute scientists have engineered bacteria to create sugar from the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. All life on the planet relies, in one way or another, on a process called carbon fixation – the ability of plants, algae and certain bacteria to “pump” carbon dioxide (CO2) from the environment, add solar or other energy and turn it into the sugars that are the required starting point needed for life processes.
Nov 13, 2017...
Five storms traveling around the south pole. Credit: NASA
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—November 13, 2017—Under global climate change, the Earth’s climatic zones will shift toward the poles. This is not just a prediction; it is a trend that has already been observed in the past decades. The dry, semi-arid regions are expanding into higher latitudes, and temperate, rainy regions are migrating poleward. In a paper that that was recently published in Nature Geoscience, Weizmann Institute of Science researchers provide new insight into this phenomenon by discovering that mid-latitude storms are steered further toward the poles in a warmer climate. Their analysis, which also revealed the physical mechanisms controlling this phenomenon, involved a unique approach that traced the progression of low-pressure weather systems both from the outside – in their movement around the globe – and the inside, analyzing the storms’ dynamics.
Dec 26, 2006... More than half of the dust needed for fertilizing the Brazilian rainforest is supplied by a valley in northern Chad, according to an international research team headed by Dr. Ilan Koren of the Institute’s Environmental Sciences and Energy Research Department. In a study published recently in Environmental Research Letters, the scientists have explained how the Bodélé valley’s unique features might be responsible for making it such a major dust provider.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/israel-prize-to-prof-dan-yakir/
Apr 02, 2019...
Prof. Dan Yakir
The Weizmann Institute’s Prof. Dan Yakir has won this year’s Israel Prize for Research in Geology, Earth Sciences and Atmospheric Sciences, for his groundbreaking insights into the impact of semi-arid forests on the global climate.
“At the station he founded in the Yatir Forest, Prof. Yakir explores the interactions between the biosphere and the atmosphere, especially the ways in which vegetation influences the environment and the climate,” Education Minister Naftali Bennett tweeted.
Mar 02, 2020...
Farmers in arid areas of India need no convincing that the climate is changing under their feet. Their income is drying up along with their groundwater wells, forcing many to give up farming.
As these kinds of situations become more common, help is coming from Tel Aviv University's Nitsan Sustainable Development Lab directed by Ram Fishman, an expert on smallholder farmers and climate change.
His team assesses agriculture, water and energy problems in rural Asia and Africa and finds Israeli technologies to solve them.
Dec 17, 2018...
(l-r) Profs. Ilan Koren, Yoav Schechner, and Klaus Schilling are inventing a new way of imaging clouds
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—December 17, 2018—Ten satellites, each around the size of a shoebox, are slated in a few years to enter orbit and begin filling in some gaping holes in our understanding of clouds and their role in climate. Inspired by medical CT (computed tomography), which observes and maps patients’ interiors, the designers are creating a system that will reveal detailed images of clouds’ external and internal 3D structures and properties. By probing small cloud fields that are generally missed by today’s remote-sensing technologies, the mission may resolve some major uncertainties that limit current atmospheric modelling and climate prediction.
Dec 01, 2008...
The technologists and engineers of today are being asked to do something that is “close to mission impossible,” says Prof. David Cahen of the Weizmann Institute of Science’s Department of Materials and Interfaces. “We’re asking them to come up with better solutions to our energy problems based on fundamental science that essentially stopped in the mid-1980s.”
Prof. Cahen explains that after the global crash in oil prices during the early- to mid-1980s, support for research in alternative energy decreased drastically as well, resulting in what is now an extremely poor base on which to build new technologies. Meanwhile, the demand for energy is increasing worldwide, oil prices are unpredictable, and the burning of fossil fuels is causing pollution and releasing greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. “We cannot afford another period of not-so-benign neglect,” he states.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/eating-air-making-fuel/
Jun 23, 2016... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—June 23, 2016—All life on the planet relies, in one way or another, on a process called carbon fixation: the ability of plants, algae, and certain bacteria to “pump” carbon dioxide (CO2) from the environment, add solar or other energy, and turn it into the sugars that are the required starting point needed for life processes. At the top of the food chain are different organisms (some of which think, mistakenly, that they are “more advanced”) that use the opposite means of survival: they eat sugars (made by photosynthetic plants and microorganisms) and then release CO2 into the atmosphere. This means of growth is called “heterotrophism.” Humans are, of course, heterotrophs in the biological sense because the food they consume originates from the carbon fixation processes of nonhuman producers.
Feb 13, 2019...
Clouds have a key role in Earth’s energy balance and water cycle, but difficulties in assessing them can lead to great errors in climate prediction. Israeli and German scientists are now trying to overcome this problem, inspired by the most human form – bodily organs.
Their idea is to perform “CT scans” on clouds. Like human CTs that scan and map the interior of a patient, the researchers plan on using CloudCT, a space mission of 10 tiny satellites, to reveal detailed images of clouds’ external and internal 3D structures and properties.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/the-tree-that-survives-the-desert/
Jan 16, 2019... Tu B’Shevat, a Jewish holiday commemorating the importance and sanctity of trees, could not be more fitting in this day and age. Undoubtedly, it’s not easy to be a tree these days. Extended drought periods induced by climate change make it more and more difficult for those that need water to survive. Add to this the constant increase in pests and invasive species, one gets an idea of the grim reality in which many tree species are forced to survive the rapid and extreme changes.
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