to sway the u.s. presidential election examiner kogan told the u.k. parliament the data he compiled through a facebook app would have been practically useless for micro-targeting rachael's. was protest as a nicaragua refusing to back down and are now calling for the resignation of president daniel ortega human rights groups say at least twenty six people have been killed in a violent crackdown by police and protesters erupted last week after taking a launch to plan to overhaul the country's welfare system there's the top stories techno is up next i'll have more news for you soon after now. in the lead up to the historic twenty eighteen korea's summit out his era looks at

life in the normal. join me james brace for a series of special reports from north korea. here on al-jazeera. this is techno a show about innovations that can change lives the science of fighting wildfires we're going to explore the intersection of hardware and humanity and we're doing it in a unique way. this is a show about science lowballed are not by scientists. tonight. techno in search of the great american prairie where in the current state yet 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 native animals how many flat species do you have in here but volunteers

trying to bring back one of the planet's most complex ecosystems ran into trouble we just needed something that help to level the playing field why a certain animal from america's past was needed to pull off the impossible we've just arrived at the end it use a grassland and i'm seeing these bison for the first time in reach of davison is an environmental biologist tonight a trip to the heartland always a baby. deer a santa maria is a new scientist from i'm still tourism i'm an entomologist the epic drought of twenty fifteen takes a hidden toll. from above these trees may look green and healthy they're not here we see something that's dramatically different now the technology that can see when we can't. that's our team i'm a prairie fire weather now let's do some sun.

hey guys welcome to techno i'm phil tours joined by a care santa maria maria to davison and so they were going to talk to environmental stories and to start off the greats american prairie to me it's one of those iconic images of how the u.s. used to be unfortunately now it's almost entirely just a part of our history yeah there's been a lot of over development of farming and a suburban explosion that's really taken a toll on a lot of prayer ecosystems illinois has been extremely hard hit it's changing but there's 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 there's a bit of us west so there is i want to give anything away so let's go about ninety miles outside of chicago where they're bringing back a little piece of history it's kind of a big piece of history ok a big piece of history to go on. that.

you were looking at a thirty five hundred acre experiment in a growing field in known as restoration ecology. this is the new choose the grasslands preserve in franklin rove illinois ninety miles west of chicago where the nature conservancy is rolling back time two hundred 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 two thirds of the state some twenty twenty five million acres in the state was tall grass curry we have less than one one hundredth of one percent of the native curry that's still intact. the mission is being overseen by three 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 called 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 isn't alone since the late one thousand nine hundred prairie grasslands across the united states have been steadily vanishing. i've 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 it's 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

one thousand nine hundred six growing from a small plot of remnant prairie land that had never been farmed. and starting with fire the process hasn't changed much in thirty years. it's completely fire dependent without fire we could not have pretty the vegetation and grows more vigorously and most species of plants have a season of more intense blooming right after a few the first year of the second year after a fire no one knows that transition better than restoration ecologist cody considine. gray we're standing in what looks to me at least two very different types of areas what happened here so yes or right in the line of two different prairie wrester. sions the one right here was planted two years ago and the one behind this was pointed out three years ago so overseeing is as easy prey restorations get older more plants emerge they get more mature they're flooring so

they're quite dynamic how many plant species do you have in here for this particular plane and i believe we had one hundred thirty species ranging from there's a native western sunflower this is a coral species we have rattlesnake master here we have grassley and goldenrod here there's been a neck and they show here a paper book on foot already flowered. all those bloomers started here all right so this is the seed room. project director bill kleiman well you might think that the perris tube would find its way out into these former corn fields but it doesn't walk very fast so we would have to wait millennia whereas we can collect his seed from the remnant prairie's bring it out to a cornfield that we're retiring planted and it'll grow year do you have a sense of how many seeds you in the volunteers here have planted over the years about two hundred fifty species

a year so it's it's millions and millions of sea. conventional wisdom was to plant ten pounds of seeds breaker but bill ordered fifty 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 i've been doing this is my twenty first year. i'm 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 eight hundred pound grazing machines. we've just arrived at the grassland and i'm seeing these bison for the first time and i feel like i've just been transported back one hundred fifty two hundred years it's it's pretty it's pretty remarkable to see these enormous animals that were almost wiped out from north america oh there's a baby there's a little one oh a couple of. bison have been part of the vision for the project since the very beginning but it's taken us close to thirty years to be able to put together enough away and skate where it was a practical consideration for us. and . these iconic bison are 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 five hundred acre grazing area. the wire the bison so important to the restoration process bison eight grass and there the disturbances they're 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 what's the average weight of a full size bison the coyotes can range from eight hundred to eleven hundred pounds

in the balls as they mature they can get up to two thousand pounds massive so how many bison do we have on them on the reserve thirty adults and sixteen calves the calf was just born last week a little tiny want to get easily pick it up it's pretty exciting to think about the calf being born a illinois prairie that hasn't happened for probably two hundred years. what happened to bison here there was a tremendous slaughter of bison in the eight hundred seventy thousand eight hundred eighty s. . just walk is the chief scientist for the illinois chapter of the nature conservancy . as estimated by the turn of the one thousand hundreds there were probably four hundred to one thousand animals that had persisted out of that massive herd of thirty to sixty million is close to extinction it's 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 it's estimated there are about four hundred thousand bison now in north america. but most of those vice and were bred with cattle for meat production only about twenty thousand are pure american bison. that genetic line dates back to nine hundred thirteen when fourteen bison from the bronx zoo were trucked to wind cave 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 twenty fourth team and brought back twenty eight holes 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. seven 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 we're getting location information a g.p.s. point on a map every hour twenty four hours a day so can you show me what you've been seeing sure these are the bison locations for yesterday they seem to be spending a lot of time along their corral and trap pasture 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 they're like for reintroductions in the future. among the two dozen scientists doing

research at the choose is dr holly jones a conservation biologist at northern illinois university with her team she's 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 say let's see if i'm one of them and. there it is small mammals are food for aerial predators things like hog things like owls and so it's really important to know how they're doing to be able to say how the person doing as a whole and that's because if the small mammals are tasty enough to become good prey they're feasting on a healthy environment of insects and plants. what do you see since bison have been introduced we've had. thirteen lying around the world which was very surprising the line of evan and since quitting torrents of 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 twenty years ago we can look at a plot of land like this that was restored forty years ago and look in a plot of land over there that was restored six years ago and in one scene. take you straight to the white house where expecting a news conference with president donald trump and his french counterpart president emmanuel mccoll as part of that official state visit let's listen in. maloney and i are truly honored to welcome french president mccrone mrs mccrone to the white house thank you very much it's a great honor we're thrilled that the first official state visit of my presidency is not only with a great friend but with a leader of america's oldest ally the republican friends today in our nation's capital the stars and stripes proudly fly along. the tricolor flag

a symbol of the world and to the world of unity for turn today in friendship that forever links our nations together forty years after the end of our war of independence the great general af i travel to george washington's home at mount vernon to visit the grave of the father of our country president mccrone we're deeply moved that nearly two centuries later the president of the republic of france made that same tribute last night. only. this past summer malani and i had an incredible visit with you in bruges in paris to celebrate best deal day. we were all odd by the beauty of your country and the grateful hospitality of your incredible people they are incredible people

together we commemorated the one hundredth anniversary of america's entry into the first world war we remembered the french and american patriots who shed their blood together in defense of civilization their noble sacrifice will echo through time for ever and immortal tribute to our people and to our freedom during the horror of the first world war more than one million people were killed or injured from chemical warfare in the aftermath of that hora civilized nations came together to ban chemical weapons two weeks ago following syrian dictator bashar al assad's barbaric use of chemical weapons against his own people the united states france and the united kingdom joined together to

strike at the heart of the syrian chemical weapons program these actions were designed to establish a strong deterrent against the use of these heinous weapons president mccrone i thank you for your leadership in this effort and it was a well executed effort at that and i thank you and the members of the french military for their courage and their great skill the united states and france are also cooperating to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons we are grateful for france's key partnership in our campaign of maximum pressure on the north korean regime. as you know i will soon be meeting with kim jong un as we seek

a future of peace harmony and security for the whole korean peninsula and in fact for the whole world however in pursuit of peace we will not repeat the mistakes of past administrations the campaign of maximum pressure will continue france and the united states also agree that iran cannot be allowed to develop a nuclear weapon and that regime must end its support of terrorists all over you know where no matter where you go in the middle east you see the fingerprints of iran behind problems i also want to thank president mccrone for france's vital contribution to our very successful campaign against isis as we drive these isis killers from syria it is essential that the

responsible nations of the middle east step up their own contributions to prevent iran from profiting off the success of our anti isis effort very rich countries are in the middle east they have to make major contributions they have not been doing it as they should a major topic that we discussed a little while ago they have to step up tremendously not a little bit but tremendously their financial effort mr president on behalf of the american people again express our solidarity in the wake of the terrorist attack in southern france last month i share the confidence you conveyed at the memorial service for the heroic colonel built from that in time we will achieve the ultimate triumph. of right and of justice in the fight against terrorism we both

know that we must be strong from within to defend ourselves from threats outside we will do what we must to protect our countries you are our oldest ally and you are truly one of our great allies and we appreciate it we will always be there for you both the united states and france are dealing with a challenge that has gone on for a long long time it's uncontrolled migration in the united states we are taking strong action to regain control over our borders and over our sovereignty it's gone on for too long and we've slowed it down very substantially but we're going to stop illegal immigration i know that you face

similar challenges in france and mr president i admire the leadership you have shown in addressing them in a very honest and direct fashion and not always popular both of our elections so much of the success to the desire of every day citizens to be heard to be listened to edge of control over their own nations and their own futures let us demonstrate through our partnership that the voice of the people will always rain at all times it will rain during our meetings today we also discussed the robust economic relationship between our countries the united states is setting records in business and we will continue and i know that france will be setting records under your leadership very soon. we look forward to exploring increased opportunities for bilateral trade and

investment based on the principle of fairness and importantly reciprocity mr president thank you again for accepting our invitation to the white house and such an honor the foundation of our friendship draws from the deepest wells of civilization and is sustained by our people's love of their history culture and liberty for two centuries the alliance between france and the united states has been the cornerstone of freedom now the strength of this mighty alliance is in our hands linked together by fate and destiny i am confident that our future has never ever looked brighter thank you mr president. is messy thank you mr pretty don't share the knowledge and do it all know with you

thank you with the with them and yet. with you and your welcome out like to say how happy. we did the french delegation to interview the appreciate during these three days to be your guests after this remarkable visit and the honor it appears on the trip paid to his by being a president on the fourteenth of july last year in paris to be recalled mr president i think and been on a lot of talks and each expressed the depth. of the ties that you know it is goes back to the constitution of your country its founding revolution. was crowned its history there are links based on our mutual at the time deep attachment to freedom and peace each time he's

been threatened we have always been there for each other and we celebrated together all four of us yesterday evening at mount vernon where. where george washington was very able to illustrate the strength of these time is very tough if you put into a cold recently all the issues at stake i'd like to go back to some of the basic. subjects with regard to the. relations first iran you know when you're talking to. you. as a leader of the united states on this subject there is no mystery to say that we don't have the starting positions on this point and neither you nor i

have a temperament or the habit of changing positions because into the wind nevertheless we have had i think i can say a deep. exchange on the subject. do you believe the iranian deal the c.p.a. the agreement that was negotiated in two thousand and three with iran is a bad agreement for several months i've said that it is not a sufficient agreement but it allows us. in any event to have intil twenty twenty five to have control over nuclear activities we therefore wish to now be able to work on a new agreement with iran which. is what we need and i think that on this. friday expressed.

the first. party on the part of iran until twenty twenty five which only the allowed to secondly to ensure that over the long long there is no new iranian. vital substrate is to be able to stop the ballistics activity by ron in the region and the fourth vital point is to create conditions a political stability in the region and to contain better and better theory malaysian and its position in iraq in yemen and as well as the influence that has lebanon on these subjects it is a constant position to say that we must find a framework to be able to gather with the powers the countries of the ranching. and with iranian leaders to be able to succeed.