Environment

Feb 15, 2019 07:47 AM EST

Tiny satellites reveal water dynamics in thousands of northern lakes

Using an army of small satellites, researchers have shown that water levels in small lakes across northern Canada and Alaska are far more variable during the summer than previously thought. The findings, published in Geophysical Research Letters, could have implications for how scientists calculate the natural greenhouse gas emissions from these northern lakes.

Feb 15, 2019 07:22 AM EST

Surprise findings turn up the temperature on the study of vernalization

Researchers have uncovered new evidence about the agriculturally important process of vernalization in a development that could help farmers deal with financially damaging weather fluctuations.

Feb 14, 2019 08:20 AM EST

Satellite images reveal interconnected plumbing system that caused Bali volcano to erupt

A team of scientists, led by the University of Bristol, has used satellite technology provided by the European Space Agency (ESA) to uncover why the Agung volcano in Bali erupted in November 2017 after 50 years of dormancy.

Feb 13, 2019 08:56 AM EST

Ice shelves buckle under weight of meltwater lakes

For the first time, a research team co-led by CIRES-based scientists, has directly observed an Antarctic ice shelf bending under the weight of ponding meltwater on top, a phenomenon that may have triggered the 2002 collapse of the Larsen B ice shelf. And ice shelf flexure could potentially impact other vulnerable ice shelves, causing them to break up, quickening the discharge of ice into the ocean and contributing to global sea level rise.

Feb 13, 2019 08:49 AM EST

Surface lakes cause Antarctic ice shelves to 'flex'

The filling and draining of meltwater lakes have been found to cause a floating Antarctic ice shelf to flex, potentially threatening its stability.

Feb 08, 2019 09:02 PM EST

Rating riverside corridors -- the 'escape routes' for animals under climate change

Under climate change, plants and animals will shift their habitats to track the conditions they are adapted for. As they do, the lands surrounding rivers and streams offer natural migration routes that will take on a new importance as temperatures rise.

Feb 08, 2019 09:32 AM EST

DNA traces on wild flowers reveal insect visitors

Researchers have discovered that insects leave tiny DNA traces on the flowers they visit; the newly developed eDNA method holds a vast potential for various parts of nature management

The German Eesearch Vessel Sonne (IMAGE)

Feb 07, 2019 10:38 AM EST

Deep sea reveals linkage between earthquake and carbon cycle

An international team led by the Innsbruck geologists Arata Kioka, Tobias Schwestermann, Jasper Moernaut, and Michael Strasser could quantify for the first time the entire trench-wide volume of marine sediments that were remobilized by the magnitude 9 Tohoku-oki earthquake in 2011 and transported into the up to 8 km deep Japan Trench.

Feb 07, 2019 10:07 AM EST

CABI helps map ferocious speed and likely cause of woody weed spread across Ethiopia

CABI scientists have helped map the ferocious speed and probable cause of a devastating spread of the invasive alien tree Prosopis juliflora (Swartz DC) across an area equivalent to half of neighbouring Djibouti in the Afar Region of north eastern Ethiopia.

Feb 06, 2019 08:16 AM EST

Underwater forests threatened by future climate change

Researchers at the University of Sydney and the Sydney Institute of Marine Science have found that climate change could lead to declines of underwater kelp forests through impacts on their microbiome.

Feb 06, 2019 08:12 AM EST

NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite catches development of Tropical Cyclone 12S

Tropical Cyclone 12S has developed east of the African island nation of Madagascar. NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite passed over the Southern Indian Ocean and captured a visible image of the newly formed storm that has triggered a warning for Rodrigues, an outer island of the Republic of Mauritius.

Feb 06, 2019 08:08 AM EST

Gypsum as an agricultural product

Gypsum is a mineral that is naturally found concentrated in various places and can be mined out of the ground. But Dick's research focuses on gypsum recovered from coal-fired electricity generating power plants.

The Landscape Neumann and Team Studied in Alaska (IMAGE)

Feb 05, 2019 08:19 AM EST

Early spring rain boosts methane from thawing permafrost by 30 percent

Arctic permafrost is thawing as the Earth warms due to climate change. In some cases, scientists predict that this thawing soil will release increasing amounts of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, that is known to trap more heat in our planet's atmosphere.

Feb 04, 2019 08:11 AM EST

Lettuce show you how to restore oil-soaked soil

Rice University engineers have figured out how soil contaminated by heavy oil can not only be cleaned but made fertile again.

New Analysis of Deforestation in Indonesia

Feb 04, 2019 08:08 AM EST

Palm oil not the only driver of forest loss in Indonesia

Large-scale agriculture, primarily for growing oil palms, remains a major cause of deforestation in Indonesia, but its impact has diminished proportionately in recent years as other natural and human causes emerge, a new Duke University study finds.