news

Environment - Earth Sciences - 30.11.2022

Clouds less sensitive to climate than assumed
Trade wind cumulus clouds are found on about 20 percent of the globe and cool the planet. Until now, it was expected that these clouds would become fewer due to global warming and thus exacerbate climate change. A team led by Dr. Raphaela Vogel of the University of Hamburg has now been able to disprove this.

Earth Sciences - Astronomy / Space Science - 29.11.2022

Mapping the chemistry of the Earth’s mantle
The Earth's mantle makes up about 85% of the Earth's volume and is made of solid rock. But what rock types is the mantle exactly made of, and how are they distributed throughout the mantle? An international team of researchers - including UT researcher Dr Juan Carlos Afonso (Faculty of ITC) - have been able to reveal the existence of pockets of rocks with abnormal properties that suggest that they were once created at the surface, transported to vast depths along subduction zones, and accumulated at specific depths inside the Earth's mantle.

Chemistry - Earth Sciences - 24.11.2022

Possible organic compounds found in Mars crater rocks
Rock samples from the Jezero crater analysed by the Perseverance rover show evidence of liquid water and signatures that could be organic compounds. A study published in Science analyses multiple rocks found at the bottom of Jezero Crater on Mars, where the Perseverance rover landed in 2020, revealing significant interaction between the rocks and liquid water.

Earth Sciences - Environment - 18.11.2022

Sea level rise to dramatically speed up erosion of rock coastlines by 2100
Rock coasts, which make up over half the world's coastlines, could retreat more rapidly in the future due to accelerating sea level rise. This is according to new research led by Imperial College London and supported by researchers from the University of Glasgow. The researchers modelled likely future cliff retreat rates of two rock coasts in the UK, based on forecasts of sea level rise for different greenhouse gas emissions and climate change scenarios.

Environment - Earth Sciences - 17.11.2022

Millions at risk as drylands degrade, finds study
Drylands are experiencing increasingly levels of degradation and desertification, changes that could put already vulnerable populations at greater risk. A research team, including Natasha MacBean , conducted an examination of dryland productivity and its important role in global carbon and water cycling, to understand the impact of climate change and human activity on future dryland ecosystem functioning.

Earth Sciences - Environment - 16.11.2022

Buffer effect of Greenland’s firn could cease around 2130
Increasing melt threatens to saturate the firn layer that covers the Greenland ice sheet. Saturation of this layer will dramatically increase global sea level rise, adding about 9 mm a year from the Greenland ice sheet alone (the current sea level rise from all sources is about 4 mm per year). A new study by researchers from Utrecht University, the US National Center for Atmospheric Research, and University of Colorado Boulder now shows that this threshold could be reached as early as the first half of the 22 century.

Earth Sciences - Astronomy / Space Science - 16.11.2022

New observation method helps unlock secrets of U.K. meteorite
The Winchcombe meteorite, a rare carbonaceous meteorite which crashed onto a driveway in Gloucestershire in 2021, has been found to contain extra-terrestrial water and organic compounds that reveal insights into the origin of Earth's oceans. A new study, published today by Science Advances , led by experts from the Natural History Museum and the University of Glasgow reports the orbital history and first laboratory analyses of the Winchcombe meteorite, which was recovered only hours after its spectacular fireball lit up the skies over the U.K. in February 2021.

Earth Sciences - Chemistry - 16.11.2022

Winchcombe meteorite holds information about the origin of Earth’s oceans
The Winchcombe meteorite, a rare carbonaceous meteorite which crashed onto a driveway in Gloucestershire, has been found to contain extra-terrestrial water and organic compounds that reveal insights into the origin of Earth's oceans. A new study led by experts from the Natural History Museum and the University of Glasgow reports the orbital history and first laboratory analyses of the Winchcombe meteorite, which was recovered only hours after its spectacular fireball lit up the skies over the UK in February 2021.

Environment - Earth Sciences - 16.11.2022

Earth can regulate its own temperature over millennia
Scientists have confirmed that a "stabilizing feedback" on 100,000-year timescales keeps global temperatures in check. The Earth's climate has undergone some big changes, from global volcanism to planet-cooling ice ages and dramatic shifts in solar radiation. And yet life, for the last 3.7 billion years, has kept on beating.

Environment - Earth Sciences - 10.11.2022

A river runs beneath it: new study discovers a 460-km river under the Antarctica ice sheet
The discovery of a 460 km river under the Antarctica ice sheet could be the missing link to climate models. A team of researchers led by Dr. Christine Dow, a professor in the department of Geography and Environmental Management and cross-appointed to the Department of Applied Mathematics, discovered the river from a series of airborne radar surveys and modelling.

Environment - Earth Sciences - 07.11.2022

Working with mountain communities could help water systems adapt to climate
Imperial scientists have shared how working directly with mountain communities could drive adaptation to the loss of their main water sources. Nearly two billion people globally rely on mountain water for drinking and irrigation, but this water source is under threat due to global heating. Mountainous regions are particularly impacted by the effects of the climate crisis , with melting glaciers and snow adding to water scarcity in regions such as the Himalayas, Central Asia, and Andes.

Environment - Earth Sciences - 07.11.2022

Microplastic pollution threats the world’s coastal lagoons
Globally, the coastal lagoons of Lagos (Nigeria), Sakumo (Ghana) and Bizerte (Tunisia) —close to large urban centres and without waste and sewage treatment systems— are among the most affected water ecosystems of this nature by microplastic pollution. However, the highest concentrations of microplastics have been detected in Barnes Sound and other small lagoons in a protected area in the north of Florida Bay (USA), a particular case that can be explained by the transport of microplastics carried by hurricanes from polluted areas.

Environment - Earth Sciences - 07.11.2022

Green and blue food webs are wired differently
Terrestrial and aquatic food webs respond differently to changes in the environment. Understanding these differences is fundamental to identifying the species most important to an ecosystem and to effectively protecting biodiversity. This is shown by a study led by the research institutes Eawag and WSL and published in the journal Nature Communications .

Environment - Earth Sciences - 07.11.2022

Rethinking mountain water security
Water security in mountain regions relies on an understanding of the interlinks of water supply and demand that goes far beyond the study of glacier melt. Current information on how the communities which depend on water from mountain snow and ice will be affected by climate change is limited, according to new research published in Nature Sustainability.

Environment - Earth Sciences - 03.11.2022

Early snowmelt and northward jet stream setting Siberia ablaze
Earth and climate scientists from Vrije Universiteit (VU) Amsterdam united forces to disentangle the combined effects of diminishing snow cover and a changing jet stream on recent Siberian fire extremes. The study was published today in the scientific journal Science. With a total of about 200,000 km2 of forest and tundra burned - equaling nearly five times the size of the Netherlands - the years 2019, 2020 and 2021 were the largest fire years in northern Siberian larch forests since 2001.

Life Sciences - Earth Sciences - 03.11.2022

Ocean microbes get their diet through a surprising mix of sources
Up to one-third of the carbon consumed by Prochlorococcus may come from sources other than photosynthesis. One of the smallest and mightiest organisms on the planet is a plant-like bacterium known to marine biologists as Prochlorococcus . The green-tinted microbe measures less than a micron across, and its populations suffuse through the upper layers of the ocean, where a single teaspoon of seawater can hold millions of the tiny organisms.

Earth Sciences - 01.11.2022

Retracing the steps of Swiss explorers in the Himalaya
Daring Swiss pioneers took exciting photos and observations of glaciers in the Indian Himalayas in the 1930s. Glaciologists from WSL and the ETH Zurich now repeated their trip to collect up-to-date data. 14.09.2022 -Swiss explorers in Indian Himalaya Six Swiss pioneers explored the hidden valleys of the Garhwal range of the Indian Himalaya more than eight decades ago.

Earth Sciences - 31.10.2022

Violent supershear earthquakes are more common than previously thought
The findings suggest that disaster planning assessments should include whether a fault is able to produce supershear quakes, which are potentially more destructive than other types. Powerful supershear earthquakes, once considered rare, are much more common than previously thought, according to a study led by UCLA geophysicists and published today in Nature Geoscience.

Astronomy / Space Science - Earth Sciences - 28.10.2022

NASA and ESA Agree on Next Steps to Return Mars Samples to Earth
The agency's Perseverance rover will establish the first sample depot on Mars. The next step in the unprecedented campaign to return scientifically selected samples from Mars was made on Oct. 19 with a formal agreement between NASA and its partner ESA (European Space Agency). The two agencies will proceed with the creation of a sample tube depot on Mars.

Earth Sciences - Astronomy / Space Science - 27.10.2022

What seismic waves reveal about Martian crust
Following two large meteorite impacts on Mars, researchers have observed, for the first time, seismic waves propagating along the surface of a planet other than Earth. The data from the marsquakes was recorded by NASA's InSight lander and analysed at ETH Zurich in collaboration with the InSight Science Team.