Understanding how mountains form is critically important — from volcanic eruptions to earthquakes to catastrophic mudslides, the geologic processes active in mountain belts affect human societies every day. Yet, even though mountains are on all continents and in all ocean basins, scientists still understand relatively little about the forces that interact to form and destroy mountains, how mountains change over time, and the relationship between mountains and Earth’s climate.
To better
The discovery of 160 year old records in the archives of the Royal Society, London, has given scientists further evidence that Australian sea levels are rising.
Observations taken at Tasmania’s Port Arthur convict settlement 160 years ago by an amateur meteorologist have been compared with data from a modern tide gauge.
“There is a rate of sea level rise of about 1mm a year, consistent with other Australian observations,” says Dr David Pugh, from the UK’s Southampton Ocean
The spectacular aurora borealis displays that light up the northern nights could be powered by a gigantic “slinky” effect in Earth’s magnetic field lines, according to research performed at the University of Minnesota. Earth’s magnetic field resemble a slinky in that when “wiggled,” it undulates in waves that travel down the field lines at speeds up to 25 million miles per hour. These waves can pass energy to electrons, accelerating them along the magnetic field lines toward Earth. When the
Mysterious patterns arise through simple feedback mechanisms and self-organization
Perfect circles of stones cover the ground in parts of Alaska and the Norwegian islands of Spitsbergen. Elsewhere in the far north, stones form other striking patterns on the ground: polygons, stripes, islands, and labyrinths. No, pranksters are not at work in these remote areas, nor are aliens, elves, or any other outside forces moving the stones around. According to scientists who have studied the phe
A doctor gets a better view inside a patient by probing the body with CAT and MRI scanning equipment. Now, NASA meteorologists have done a kind of “full-body scan” of an evolving thunderstorm in the tropics, using advanced radar equipment to provide a remarkable picture of the storm’s anatomy. The observations are expected to help double-check satellite rainfall measurements, improve computer models of storms, and make the skies safer for airplanes to navigate.
David Atlas of NASA’s Goddar
NASA-funded scientists have recently learned that cloud-to-ground lightning frequently strikes the ground in two or more places and that the chances of being struck are about 45 percent higher than what people commonly assume.
Recently, William C. Valine and E. Philip Krider in the Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the University of Arizona, co-authors of the study, took to the field using video and other technology to study lightning, which is one of the biggest weather-related killers i
Findings detailed in Jan. 16 issue of Nature; greenhouse gases implicated
A study by University of Massachusetts Amherst geoscientist Robert DeConto posits an alternative theory regarding why Antarctica suddenly became glaciated 34 million years ago. The study challenges previous thinking about why the ice sheet formed and holds ramifications for the next several hundred years as greenhouse gases continue to rise. DeConto, who collaborated with David Pollard of Pennsylvania State Univ
Two University of York graduates have found and preserved the giant tusk of the largest elephant fossil of its type ever to be found in the Middle East.
The tusk, two-and-a-half metres long and thought to be between six and eight million years old, was discovered by Dr Mark Beech, who finished his PhD at York recently and is now senior resident archaeologist for the Abu Dhabi Islands Archaeological Survey (ADIAS).
Mark discovered the tusk in Abu Dhabi’s Western Region last October
Climate change had little to do with the demise of the dinosaurs, but the last million years before their extinction had a complex pattern of warming and cooling events that are important to our understanding of the end of their reign, according to geologists.
“The terrestrial paleoclimate record near the K-T is historically contradictory and poorly resolved,” says Dr. Peter Wilf, assistant professor of geosciences at Penn State. “In contrast, the resolution of K-T marine climates that has
An Australian geologist has identified what could be the first ever active flow of fluids through gullies on Mars.
University of Melbourne geologist, Dr Nick Hoffman, identified recent gully and channel development near the polar regions of Mars from images taken by the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft. But contrary to the majority of scientific opinion which suggests that such features were carved by liquid water, Hoffman says the flow is most likely frozen carbon dioxide.
Researchers at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have discovered another fingerprint of human effects on global climate.
Recent research has shown that increases in the height of the tropopause over the past two decades are directly linked to ozone depletion and increased greenhouse gases.
The tropopause is the transition zone between the lowest layer of the atmosphere — the turbulently-mixed troposphere — and the more stable stratosphere. The tropopause lies rough
Rocks deposited by glaciers on mountain ranges in West Antarctica have given scientists the most direct evidence yet that parts of the ice sheet are on a long-term, natural trajectory of melting.
The West Antarctic Ice Sheet has been melting and contributing water continuously to the ocean for the last 10,000 years and is likely to keep doing so, says John Stone, University of Washington associate professor of Earth and space sciences.
Measuring and understanding changes in the Eart
Using models that simulate the interaction between global climate and land ecosystems, atmospheric scientists from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have shown that compensating for the carbon dioxide “greenhouse effect” by decreasing the amount of sunlight reaching the planet (geoengineering) could create a more vigorous ecosystem while helping to curb global warming.
The study suggests that planetary-scale engineering projects to lessen the amount of solar radiation reaching the
NSF-supported researchers drilling into Lake Vida, an Antarctic “ice-block” lake, have found the lake isn’t really an ice block at all. In the December 16 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the team reveals that Antarctic Lake Vida may represent a previously unknown ecosystem, a frigid, “ice-sealed,” lake that contains the thickest non-glacial lake ice cover on Earth and water seven times saltier than seawater.
Because of the arid, chilled environment in which i
A greater number of large “planetary sized waves” in the atmosphere that move from the lower atmosphere into the upper atmosphere were responsible for the smaller Antarctic ozone hole this fall, according to NASA researchers. The September 2002 ozone hole was half the size it was in 2000. However, scientists say that these large-scale weather patterns in the Earth’s atmosphere are not an indication that the ozone layer is recovering.
Paul Newman, a lead researcher on ozone at NASA’
The broad-scale warming expected from increased greenhouse gases may actually sap the strength of a typical El Niño, according to researchers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colorado. In contrast, the average El Niño during the last ice age may have packed more punch than today’s. The scientists have examined the past and future behavior of El Niño using a sophisticated computer model of global climate. They present their results this week at the annual meeting
Feedback
