Britney Schmidt is in Antarctica through February 2022 with a small team of researchers to explore the confluence of glaciers, floating ice shelves and ocean using a submarine robot called Icefin – the first mission of its kind. But the whole time, she’ll also be thinking about worlds beyond Earth.
Multidisciplinary team of materials physicists and geophysicists combine theoretical predictions, simulations, and seismic tomography to find spin transition in the Earth’s mantle. Their findings will improve understanding of the Earth’s interior, and help elucidate the impact of this phenomenon on tectonic events including volcanic eruptions and earthquakes.
Recent research into the way cracks in the earth’s crust open and close along the San Andreas Fault has yielded a new way of studying earthquake behavior that bridges an important gap between laboratory experiments and earth observations, demonstrating a new way to study upper crustal behavior.
Since the Perseverance rover landed in Jezero crater on Mars in February, the rover and its team of scientists back on Earth have been hard at work exploring the floor of the crater that once held an ancient lake.
Over time, concrete cracks and crumbles. Well, most concrete cracks and crumbles. Structures built in ancient Rome are still standing, exhibiting remarkable durability despite conditions that would devastate modern concrete.
One of these structures is the large cylindrical tomb of first-century noblewoman Caecilia Metella. New research shows that the quality of the concrete of her tomb may exceed that of her male contemporaries’ monuments because of the volcanic aggregate the builders chose and the unusual chemical interactions with rain and groundwater with that aggregate over two millennia.
Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed a method to determine the orientation of mechanical stress in the earth’s crust without relying on data from earthquakes or drilling.
A lunar probe launched by the Chinese space agency recently brought back the first fresh samples of rock and debris from the moon in more than 40 years. Now an international team of scientists — including an expert from Washington University in St. Louis — has determined the age of these moon rocks at close to 1.97 billion years old.
An international team has combined observations, experiments and computer modeling to better understand the repeating patterns of stones that form in frost-prone landscapes.
How widespread will the effects be as polar ice caps melt in a warming climate and release fresh water into our oceans? An international research group led by Missouri S&T researchers may have found some answers after investigating a lake on the Caribbean coast of Guatemala.Around 8,200 years ago, an ice dam collapsed and released water from two large lakes located near the current border between the United States and Canada.
The earliest solids formed in the solar system give clues to what radioactive species were made by the young sun, and which ones were inherited. By studying isotopic variations of the elements vanadium (V) and strontium (Sr), an international team of researchers including scientists from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory found that those variations are not caused by irradiation from the sun but are produced by condensation and evaporation reactions in the early solar system.
A new study led by researchers at Binghamton University, State University of New York found that the Kuroshio Current Extension is sensitive to global climate change and has the potential to warm greatly with increased carbon dioxide levels.
Researchers on the hunt for why cold eclogites mysteriously disappeared from geological records during the early stages of the Earth’s development may have found the answer, and with it clues that could help locate critical minerals today.
Argonne scientists at the Advanced Photon Source are among the first to study tiny fragments of near-Earth asteroid 162173 Ryugu, collected by a Japanese space mission. These fragments could tell us long-hidden secrets about how our planet and solar system were formed.
Researchers at Binghamton University, State University of New York have demonstrated the effectiveness of using drones to locate freshwater sources at Easter Island.
Some of the most well-known and feared aspects of climate change are its potential effects on weather patterns and how this could accelerate the melting of natural ice.
Lava samples have revealed a new truth about the geological make-up of the Earth’s crust and could have implications for volcanic eruption early warning systems, a University of Queensland-led study has found.
Greenland may be best known for its enormous continental scale ice sheet that soars up to 3,000 meters above sea level, whose rapid melting is a leading contributor to global sea level rise.
New research by Indiana University professor Natasha MacBean, supported by a NASA grant, aims to better understand dryland ecosystems, which cover about 40 percent of the Earth's surface. Drylands support about 38 percent of the world's population but are sensitive to moisture availability.
Curtin scientists are part of an international research team that studied an ancient supervolcano in Indonesia and found such volcanoes remain active and hazardous for thousands of years after a super-eruption, prompting the need for a rethink of how these potentially catastrophic events are predicted.
Vesta was hit by two other large asteroids which left large impact craters so big they cover most of the southern hemisphere of Vesta. These impacts are thought to have ejected rocky material into space. Some of these rocks reached Earth as meteorites so scientists now have actual rock samples from Vesta to study its geochemistry.
Cornell professor and collaborators collect data that could provide new insight into the mechanics of crustal faults and possibly help researchers understand and anticipate future earthquake clusters.
A new analysis of 2.5-billion-year-old rocks from Australia finds that volcanic eruptions may have stimulated population surges of marine microorganisms, creating the first puffs of oxygen into the atmosphere. This would change existing stories of Earth’s early atmosphere, which assumed that most changes in the early atmosphere were controlled by geologic or chemical processes.
Ocean deoxygenation during the Mesozoic Era was much more rapid than previous thought, with CO2 induced environmental warming creating ocean ‘dead zones’ over timescales of only tens of thousands of years.
Scientists at the University of Southampton have discovered that extensive chains of volcanoes have been responsible for both emitting and then removing atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) over geological time.
The findings of a new study by the University of Liverpool provides further evidence of an approximately 200-million-year long cycle in the strength of the Earth’s magnetic field.
Expert Q&A: Do breakthrough cases mean we will soon need COVID boosters? The extremely contagious Delta variant continues to spread, prompting mask mandates, proof of vaccination, and other measures. Media invited to ask the experts about these and related topics.
New research from Florida State University and Rice University is providing a better estimate of the amount of carbon in the Earth’s outer core, and the work suggests the core could be the planet’s largest reservoir of that element.
A new study predicts that any sea level rise in the world’s most southern continent will be countered by an increase in snowfall, associated with a warmer Polar atmosphere. Using modern methods to calculate projected changes to sea levels, researchers discovered that the two ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica respond differently, reflecting their very distinct local climates.
مدينة روتشستر، ولاية مينيسوتا— حصوات الكُلى البشرية قديمة قِدم أهرامات الجيزة على الأقل. لقد عُثر على أقدم حصوة كُلى في قماش الساتان المُستخدم في الدفن المصري تعود إلى عام 4400 قبل الميلاد. وقد قامت مايو كلينك في العام الماضي بمعالجة وتحليل حوالي 90,000 حصوة كُلى من جميع أنحاء العالم.
Los cálculos renales en los seres humanos son tan antiguos como las pirámides de Guiza y, de hecho, el cálculo renal más antiguo se encontró en un satén mortuorio egipcio del año 4400 A.C. El año pasado, Mayo Clinic procesó y analizó aproximadamente 90 000 cálculos renales procedentes de todo el mundo.
Deep-sea mining in international waters could begin in two years – but researchers say this is unnecessary and could cause irreversible damage to marine ecosystems.
Challenges and progress toward the holy grail of geothermal energy—tapping into the superhot rock deep beneath our feet that could help wean the world from fossil fuels—were the focus of two hour-long sessions at PIVOT21, a geothermal conference July 19-23 featuring more than 165 experts in the field from around the world.
Paul Ziemkiewicz, director of the West Virginia Water Research Institute, said the funds are critical for engaging young faculty in water research and for nurturing new and larger research opportunities.
The remains of microscopic plankton blooms in near-shore ocean environments slowly sink to the seafloor, setting off processes that forever alter an important record of Earth’s history, according to research from geoscientists, including David Fike at Washington University in St. Louis.Fike is co-author of a new study published in Nature Communications.
The sun provides a daunting source of electromagnetic disarray - chaotic, random energy emitted by the massive ball of gas arrives to Earth in a wide spectrum of radio frequencies.
Scientists from the U.S. and South Africa are launching a campaign to map marine, freshwater, and terrestrial species and ecosystems in one of Earth’s biodiversity hotspots: the Greater Cape Floristic Region at the southwestern edge of South Africa.
Seismic waves passing through the ground near Longyearbyen in the Adventdalen valley, Svalbard, Norway have been slowing down steadily over the past three years, most likely due to permafrost warming in the Arctic valley.
East Africa has been getting progressively drier over the past million years, according to examinations of ancient rock by researchers including faculty at Binghamton University, State University of New York.
A Case Western Reserve University researcher is leading an interdisciplinary global team that will use state-of-the-art technology to tackle an ancient question: How did ecological factors affect the evolution of our ancestors millions of years ago? The possible answers so intrigued the W. M. Keck Foundation that it awarded Armington Professor Beverly Saylor and her colleagues a $1.2 million grant to explore them.
Petroglyphs are carved in a material called rock varnish, the origins of which have been debated for years. Now, scientists argue it’s the result of bacteria and an adaptation that protects them from the desert sun’s harsh rays.