Democratic challenger joe biden is leading in Many National polls with just over 2 weeks before the election john hendren has more from washington d. C. Hes been playing defense all across the map in florida georgia and iowa hes been campaigning those are all states that he should have handily in his column by now but National Polls show him behind across the u. S. The latest poll i saw said 12 Percentage Points behind joe biden and hes also behind in key battleground states those include michigan in wisconsin the 2 states that hes going to now so he has been aggressive there speaking very much like hes on this steroids that he was on just days ago when he tested positive for the coronavirus standing in front of the air force one to showing people that hes back. A u. N. Arms embargo on iran has expired after 13 years it was lifted as part of the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers the us withdrew from the pact in 2018 and its voiced a strong opposition to any easing of sanctions there Indian Foreign minister said if welcomed the development calling it a win for Regional Peace and security protests as of march in lebanon to mark in years since the start of mass antigovernment demonstrations theyre calling for a complete overhaul of the political system after years of corruption and mismanagement 2 governments have resigned since the rallies began police have fired tear gas and rubber bullets government protesters in haiti is the country marks its Independence Day demonstrators have been calling for president jovan y z to step done for the year over corruption charges and those are the headlines the news continues here on in about half an hour after techno good bye. On the deserted streets of theyve become familiar figures couriers on bicycles delivering food or medicine to lock down colombians most of them here are venezuelan migrants. Mother of 4 says contagion is always on her mind none of them receive Health Insurance for their work and exposing themselves and very few seem to have it yet there may be a bright side people who look down on them as skilled migrants now say theyre essential to control the virus i receive messages on the scene that me under you knows i was a nurse back what im doing is not all that different from my passion helping others. Because all this is an elbow thats a whole. Lot of looks like the part of the debate you can jump into the conversation when no topic is off the table youre not afraid of anyone take. 3 talking reacher and the poor getting poorer its not to destroy the system its just to look at the system and. This street on out is there a. This is techno innovations that can change lives the science of fighting fire were going to explore the intersection of hardware and humanity and were doing it in the unique way. This is a show about science at all are now by scientists. Tonight. Techno in search of the Great American prairie where in the current state yeah ironically we have such little of it left farming and over development killed it now get ready for this explosion of color and the return of these made a vandals how many plants species do you have in here but volunteers trying to bring back one of the planets most complex ecosystems ran into trouble we just needed something that help to level the Playing Field why a certain animal from americas past was needed to pull off the impossible weve just arrived at the grassland and im seeing these bison for the 1st time marie to davison is an environmental biologist tonight a trip to the heartland always a baby. Dearest santa maria is a neuroscientist im phil tourism im an entomologist at big drought of 2015 takes a hidden toll. From above these trees may look green and healthy theyre not here we see something thats dramatically different now the technology that can see we cant. Thats our team im a prairie fire weather now lets do some sun its. A guys welcome to techno on phil tours joined by kara Santa Maria Maria to davison and say were going to talk to environmental stories and to start off the Great American prairie to me its one of those Iconic Images of how the us used to be unfortunately now its almost entirely just a part of our history yeah theres been a lot of over development of farming and a suburban explosion thats really taken a toll on a lot of prayer ecosystems illinois has been extremely hard hit its changing but theres been a big change in the landscape there yet this is happening across the United States but i got to say what i really love about this story is that its a bit of its west so there is i want to give anything away so lets go about 90 miles outside of chicago where theyre bringing back a little piece of history its kind of a big piece of history ok a big piece of history to go on. Youre looking at a 3500. 00 acre experiment in a growing field in known as restoration ecology. This is the new choose the grasslands preserve in Franklin Grove illinois 90 miles west of chicago where the Nature Conservancy is rolling back time 200 years to restore a tall grass prarie that was almost extinct. Were in the curry state yeah ironically we have such little of it left at the time of european settlement about 2 thirds of the state some 2025 1000000 acres of the state was tall Grass Prairie we have less than 1100th of one percent of the Native Prairie that still intact. The mission is being overseen by 3 illinois and natives jeff walk director of science for the Nature Conservancy project director bill kleiman and restoration ecologist Cody Considine. It was a vast landscape dominated by those grasses but the real diversity of the prairie was in the wild flowers the forms the broadly plants and thousands of species of insects and dozens of birds and mammals and reptiles i call the prairie home along with the animals like the bison. What was once this bass landscape across much of illinois has been virtually eliminated and turned into the corn belt. But illinois isnt alone since the late 1900 sprit grasslands across the United States have been steadily vanishing. Ive heard grasslands and general referred to as the unheralded counterparts of the rain forest and grasslands have a Critical Role in terms of Climate Change as well in a prairie most of that carbon is stored in the soil and so its very secure for very long term storage a soil organic matter in essence the plants of the tall grass prarie absorb Carbon Dioxide trapping it in their deep roots. The restoration began in 1906 growing from a small plot of remnant prairie land that had never been farmed. And starting with fire the process hasnt changed much in 30 years. Its completely fire dependent without fire we could not have pretty the vegetation grows more vigorously and most species of plants have a season of more intense blooming right after a few the 1st year of the 2nd year after a fire no one knows that transition better than restoration ecologist Cody Considine. Gray were standing in what looks to me at least 2 very different types of areas what happened here so yes or right in the line of 2 different prayer esther. The one right here was planted 2 years ago and the one behind us was planted out 3 years ago so overseeing is as easy prey restorations get older more plants emerge they get more mature theyre flooring so theyre quite dynamic how many plant species do you have in here for this particular plane and i believe we had 130 species ranging from theres a native western sunflower this is a coral species we have rattlesnake master here we have grassley of goldenrod here theres been a neck in a show here a paper book on foot already flour. All those bloomers started here all right so this is the seed room you know project director bill kleiman well you might think that the prairie stude would find its way out into these former corn fields but it doesnt walk very fast so we would have to wait millennia whereas we can collect his seed from the remnant prairie is bring it out to a corn field that were retiring planted and itll grow back year do you have a sense of how many seeds you in the volunteers here have planted over the years about 250. 00 species a year so its its millions and millions of sea. Conventional wisdom was to plant 10 pounds of seeds breaker but bill ordered 50 pounds and the fields blossomed none of that would be possible without a core of volunteers like jay stacey. So what are you cutting today this particular for is called per coreopsis scientific name coreopsis pomade how long have you been doing this ive been doing this is my 21st year. Im a prairie bar where. All the tall grass planting was a little too successful. We just needed something that help to level the Playing Field. What they needed was something to thin out the grass. Like an enormous vacuum the solution not a dyson but a herd of bison. A posse of 800 pound grazing machines. Weve just arrived at the use a grassland and im seeing these bison for the 1st time and i feel like ive just been transported back 15200 years its its pretty its pretty remarkable to see these enormous animals that were almost wiped out from north america all theres a baby theres a little one 0 a couple of. Bison have been part of the vision for the project since the very beginning but its taken us close to 30 years to be able to put together enough of a landscape where it was a practical consideration for us. To. These iconic bison were the missing link for a massive restoration of this endangered tall Grass Prairie run by the Nature Conservancy. Would you say that they have been a Game Changing factor here. As these animals are going to make a difference on this prairie. I hitched a ride with misuse of project director bill kleiman and restoration ecologist Cody Considine to track down the bison in their 500 acre grazing area. The wire the bison so important to the restoration process bison 8 grass and there the disturbances theyre creating puts diversity on the landscape as they graze the nutrients are going in one of them is coming out the back and they are getting a very quick Nutrient Cycling on the prairie. Those bison patties are spreading seeds and fertilizing the soil whats the average weight of a full size bison the coyotes can range from 8021100 pounds in the bowls as they mature they can get up to 2000 pounds massive so how many bison do we have on them on the reserve 30 adults and 16 calves the calf was just born last week a little tiny want to get easily pick it up its pretty exciting to think about the calf being born a villain or a prairie that hasnt happened for probably 200 years. What happened to bison here there was a tremendous slaughter of bison in the 870880 s. Just walk is the chief scientist for the illinois chapter of the Nature Conservancy. As estimated by the turn of the 1000s there were probably 4021000 animals that had persisted out of that massive herd of 30 to 60000000 is close to extinction its absolutely closely extinction there was definitely a market for the hides for the meats also part of it is that it was encouraged by the u. S. Government as a strategy to help reduce the food supply for the native americans in the conflict with the native american peoples its estimated there are about 400000 bison now in north america. But most of those mice and were bred with cattle for meat production only about 20000. 00 are pure american bison. That genetic line dates back to 913 when 14 bison from the bronx zoo were trucked to win National Park in south dakota at the behest of teddy roosevelt. So when it was time to bring bison to choose they looked for a posse with the wind lineage. We went to broken code on grassland another Nature Conservancy preserve in northwest. When i was in the october 24th team and brought back 20 animals with us we essentially separated off the animals that we were going to bring back to illinois make sure that they were out a clean bill of health. 7 of the females we strapped g. P. S. Collars onto so that we can get near real time movements of the animals tracking those movements with the g. P. S. Collars is julio brockman a bison researcher at Southern Illinois university. What kind of data are you receiving so were getting Location Information a g. P. S. Point on a map every hour 24 hours a day so can you show me what youve been seeing sure these are the bison locations for yesterday they seem to be spending a lot of time along their corral and trap pressure and i can corroborate that because we were there and we saw them there so what would you say is the ultimate goal of your study having an amount of data really changes how we look at their movements and their selection it helps to understand what type of habitat theyre like for reintroduction in the future. Among the 2 dozen scientists doing research at the choose is dr holly jones a conservation biologist at Northern Illinois university with her team shes traveling in tagging small mammals to assess the impact of the big bison. The completely restoration ecologist playground i get so excited about this field of sampling one of them and. There it is a small mammal there food for aerial predators things like hock things like owls and so its really important to know how theyre doing to be able to say how the person doing as a whole and thats because if the small mammals are tasty enough to become good prey theyre feasting on a healthy environment of insects and plants. What do you see since bison have been introduced weve had. 13 lying around the world which was very surprising the line of evidence is pointing towards a shift in Community Compositions and there are different plots of land that have been restored at different times and all the way back to 20 years ago we can look at a plot of land like this that was restored 4 years ago and were going to part of land over there that was restored 6 years ago and one sees and look at how restoration progresses. Through. How we become for science in the same way. You can when you go there. Less than a year since the bisons arrival the Environmental Impact is subtle some changes to plant growth and small animal populations but the biggest change may be on humans. For a very connected to this herd they still feel like these are their bodies and this is such a cool thing that weve returned this iconic mammal to illinois its exciting. I got to say i love when you guys bring stuff back from the field especially from someplace as iconic as tall grass per summery what did you bring us at 1st till you got to stand up ok ill tell you are about 62 ok so here is a tall grass from the tall grass player that is some tall grass stalk i mean i was literally swimming in this stuff you know this is amazing this is part of the vegetation were taught in this is what the bison munch on this is thats exactly what they munch on this is what the bison were brought in to help control the good news. Now these are little seed pods they look like Musical Instruments but theyre seed pods of some of the vegetation on the prairie and a nice little ring to get and this is what theyve been using to replant some of the native vegetation and then where this this is the last piece of the puzzle this is a bison for any way. That surprisingly soft yet and. Can see their stuff in their arrows a lot of stuff in here so you can see really easily how bison would be dispersing you know these these little seed these large sea disperses across the prairie a word does even turn a shape like a bicycle when i was looking at that footage i was blown away by the color in the prairie the biodiversity the flowering plants and i wonder if a lot of people have that preconceived notion that nothing grows there would if i told you kara that along with tropical rain forests prairie lands and other grasslands are the most biodiverse complex ecosystems in the world would you believe me. I mean i believe you because you are an expert its right its its totally true but it does hold my mind and i thought it was really interesting to learn how important the prairie land is here in america for you know this because language change problem that were all facing these these grasses and these different plants actually act as a kind of a carbon sink dont they they really do the bulk of the plants in the prairie are not above ground theyre underground because thats how they survive fire they actually are a big factor in storing carbon yeah and that really does feed into the very next story read until you guys tag team do a little verify both from this guy and from the ground you know i got to see california forests from an airplane like no other and while you were in your flying laboratory i was on the ground seeing the reality of trees and whats taken him down. Is so epic its so out of the norm that we actually dont have the answer to what can we expect long term californias epic drone. Reservoirs are near empty farmers herding and its forests are aflame or under attack by opportunistic casts so were seeing tree mortality all over the landscape but in order to understand these changes to forests scientists must 1st assess their health using field officers and airplanes we have the most advanced airborne Remote Sensing package that i know of on earth today for over a decade ecologist greg as near has been monitoring the health of forests around the world in an aircraft called the carnegie airborne observatory techno profiled his work mapping the amazon in a previous episode this time we joined him on his latest effort to map drought plagued california forests in his tricked out door need to 28. In the back of the aircraft are unique sensors designed to take measurements of the forest canopy while the plane flies over it were flying over about 8000000. 00 trees per hour one of these instruments is known as light our this instrument is a laser system that fires 2 lasers out of the bottom of the plane in a pattern that image is the forest canopy over it ever it is that we fly over in 3 d. What the instruments do is provide us a very accurate very unique way of understanding the amount of carbon stored in californias forests if you dont put carbon in forests then it ends up in the atmosphere and that contributes to Climate Change the plane is also equipped with a pair of spectrometers used to detect the chemical composition of trees it was time for takeoff where we going today today were heading out pretty close to the oregon border where we have a lot of force thats unknown in terms of its drought stress and with that we were off. From the air we could see reservoirs in rivers clearly depleted of water lake shasta reservoir thats right its a lot of water policy what you see walk approach but the forest canopy actually looks pretty green but the big. It looks like theyre pretty good cheap majority of california is porous. Throughout stress today by. Is that most of these forests are in trouble back at the lab as theres team got to work analyzing all the data thats where techno still torres picks up the story see you did a flight with merida these are the results and looking at the cockpit it looked green but here we see something thats dramatically different and what you see we see that the forest is varies from what we would consider pretty average conditions in the yellows and blues up there down to areas that looks severely drought stricken in red next we looked at an area where the drought stress was more acute so this is from Los Padres National forest this is what it looks like when you fly over gray green looks like your typical southern cal forest. This is what it looks like in chemical detail those trees are doing ok but Everything Else that is showing severe drought stress and thats showing here in red now that we have the view from above we decided to head out for a boots on the ground perspective im standing here in the middle of Los Padres National forest and as you could tell from all the dead trees behind me theres plenty of evidence of the impact of a multiyear drought one of the biggest problems here a bug that attacks water stressed pine trees. And now were talkin hours a bunch of tom coleman is an entomologist with the u. S. Forest service a lot of dead trees right here yeah this is a nice will active spot for you to. Bark beetles kill more trees than any other kind of insect or disease in north america then you just look across the landscape and you see this kind of patchwork of dead trees mortality is quite dramatic this tree here is full of thousands of bark beetles does that mean that all the trees around here are now susceptible right. From what ive seen its just basically across the entire landscape have you ever seen this but not here in california. So just 10 minutes where were looking at the devastation caused by the pine beetles and now we are here and you can see the damage done by forest fires and theres a lot going on here so even though the wildfire is actually gone through an area and cause major mortality well still see bark beetles coming in afterwards scientists studying our forest are concerned about the impacts from drought not just in california but also around the world now what were starting to worry about is whether these droughts are somehow all interrelated in length at a global scale to suit a lot of force of the world or in trouble droughts putting pressure we dont know exactly how much of the Global Forest cover is at risk but were in the process now of finally getting the measurements we need to make those predictions. The scientists that are studying these things they can say heres the problem but their hands are tied they all they can do is wait for the drought to be over for only you know to pass and try to influence management and policy they need to get the data into the right hands i think thats the plan that has to get into the hands of managers and Decision Makers so that they can actually implement changes and whether were talking about managing americas grasslands or americas choice one thing is for certain that if we have healthy ecosystems we will eventually have a healthier climate absolutely and thank you for the story today guys know from prairie being restored by bison to forest being decimated by beetles one things for sure its a complex ecosystem out there but theres a lot of scientists working hard on it thats it for now well see you next on your own techno dive deep into these stories and go behind the scenes at aljazeera dot com slash techno follow our expert contributors on Twitter FacebookInstagram Google plus and more. 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Im Steve Clements and i have a question to ask these days its hard to filter out the newly single track of whats really important in the bottom line tackles the big issues this issue United States its people its economy and the way it deals with the rest of the world the bottom line only on aljazeera. Amid new despair and destruction azerbaijan and armenia agreed to a 2nd since far a week after a russian brokered truce unravel. This and this is all just there live from doha also coming up an International Arms embargo on iran has lifted despite strong opposition from the u. S. Plus. Sticking to a familiar tune as he trails in the polls donald trump try