news 2010

The dinosaurs died out as a result of a huge asteroid strike rather than the eruption of a super volcano, according to a study published today in the journal Science . Dr Paul Bown (UCL Earth Sciences) was part of a panel of researchers who analysed more than two decades? worth of evidence to determine the cause of the Cretaceous?Tertiary (KT) mass extinction.

Researchers at the Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics at Vienna University of Technology (TU) are investigating the effects of the Earth's atmosphere on our planet's shape, its rotation and its gravitational field. The Earth's atmosphere is not only essential to support human life on Earth; it also affects our planet's shape, its rotation and its gravitational field.

Researchers at the Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics at Vienna University of Technology (TU) are investigating the effects of the Earth's atmosphere on our planet's shape, its rotation and its gravitational field. The Earth's atmosphere is not only essential to support human life on Earth; it also affects our planet's shape, its rotation and its gravitational field.

Cambridge, Mass. March 4, 2010 - Geologists have found evidence that sea ice extended to the equator 716.5 million years ago, bringing new precision to a “snowball Earth” event long suspected to have taken place around that time. Led by scientists at Harvard University, the team reports on its work this week in the journal Science.

BERKELEY — New data provide the strongest evidence to date that the world’s biggest mud volcano, which killed 13 people in 2006 and so far has displaced 30,000 people in East Java, Indonesia, was not caused by an earthquake, according to an international scientific team that includes researchers from Durham University and the University of California, Berkeley.

Professor Michael Batty (UCL Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis) and Dr Soong Kang (UCL Management Science and Innovation) applied the techniques of statistical physics to their mountain of raw data. The pair joined forces with a computational social scientist and a physicist, both based in Paris, to explore patterns of commuting by tube into central London.

Trails found in rocks dating back 565 million years are thought to be the earliest evidence of animal locomotion ever found. The newly-discovered fossils, from rocks in Newfoundland in Canada, were analysed by an international team led by Oxford University scientists. They identified over 70 fossilised trails indicating that some ancient creatures moved, in a similar way to modern sea anemones, across the seafloors of the Ediacaran Period.

February 03, 2010 — Viginia Key — Scientists at the University of Miami have analyzed images based on Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) observations taken before and just after Haiti's earthquake, on January 12. The images reveal surprising new details. The images were obtained using data from Japan's ALOS satellite and made available to the scientific community through the efforts of GEO, the Group of Earth Observation, an umbrella group of many countries that promotes the exchange of satellite data to efficiently observe our planet, and the European Space Agency (ESA).

Cambridge, Mass. January 13, 2010 - Harvard climate scientists suggest that the Tibetan Plateau—thought to be the primary source of heat that drives the South Asian monsoon—may have far less of an effect than the Himalayas and other surrounding mountains. As the monsoon brings needed rainfall and water to billions of people each year, understanding its proper origin, especially in the context of global climate change, is crucial for the future sustainability of the region.

AUSTIN, Texas - Evidence preserved in the internal skeletal structure of the world-famous fossil, Lucy, suggests the ancient human species frequently climbed trees, according to a new analysis by scientists from The Johns Hopkins University and The University of Texas at Austin.

Spectacular satellite images suggest that Mars was warm enough to sustain lakes 3 billion years ago, a period that was previously thought to be too cold and arid to sustain water on the surface, according to research published today in Geology . The research, by a team from Imperial College London and UCL, suggests that during the Hesperian Epoch, approximately 3 billion years ago, Mars had lakes made of melted ice, each around 20km wide, along parts of the equator.