Phys.org: Earth science

Weather forecasts in the Southern Hemisphere (SH) are generally less accurate than those in the Northern Hemisphere because Antarctica and the surrounding Southern Ocean have relatively few weather observations. With limited information about atmospheric conditions in one of the world's most remote regions, forecasting models often struggle to predict the movement of weather systems. This is especially true for atmospheric rivers that can trigger heavy rain, snowfall, flooding and strong winds across Australia, New Zealand, South America and Antarctica. Improving forecasts of these weather systems is essential for protecting lives and property, supporting aviation and shipping, and helping communities prepare for hazardous weather.

When we think of a volcanic eruption, rivers of glowing lava or giant columns of ash come to mind. But beneath Earth's surface, a more complex story is unfolding. Magma deep within volcanoes is more than molten rock. It is a thick mixture of melted rock and solid mineral crystals known as "magma mush". To picture it, imagine a semi-frozen granita: a slushy blend of solid ice crystals suspended in sweet liquid syrup.

When Pliny the Younger recorded his firsthand experience of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius 2,000 years ago—a cataclysm that buried Pompeii and killed his uncle, Pliny the Elder—he provided enough detail about the date to allow scientists to benchmark methods for dating volcanic eruptions.

Returning global temperatures to a climate target does not necessarily undo the damage caused by exceeding it, new Concordia-led research published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment finds.

Dryland ecosystems cover 40% of the Earth's land surface and support more than 2 billion people. According to a new study published in Nature Climate Change, they're becoming increasingly unstable.

In northeastern North America, a stretch of mountains runs 500 miles (800 kilometers) from the Adirondacks in New York to the Gaspé Peninsula in eastern Quebec. Nearly 70 million people live within a day's drive of one of the alpine zones, the areas above the tree line where trees don't grow because of harsh conditions.

Coastal flooding may seem unpredictable, a natural disaster that occurs randomly. But UCF researcher Ivan Haigh has found that recurrent coastal floods occur at highly predictable times.

The University of Rhode Island has made one of the world's longest-running beach survey efforts available online through Rhode Island Beach Dynamics Over Decades, a new public website.

As Arctic sea ice retreats, new shipping routes, expanding resource development and growing geopolitical competition are transforming one of the world's least-monitored regions. Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory have established one of the first long-term acoustic baselines for the Arctic's underwater soundscape. This work strengthens the detection and interpretation of earthquakes, underwater and nearshore detonations, ship traffic and other events of national security interest.

On the surface, the arid expanses of the Mojave Desert may seem inhospitable and largely removed from the global carbon cycle. But beneath the surface, its mineral-rich soils are running a carbon cycle of their own—one that could account for a surprisingly large share of the planet's annual carbon exchange.

Publishing original research in a top-tier academic journal has been an ambition of Arsalaan Ahmad's since he enrolled in an undergraduate computer science program at Cardiff University.

Arctic sea ice reached its annual minimum extent on Sept. 12, according to NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) at the University of Colorado Boulder. The ice covered an estimated 1.78 million square miles (4.6 million square kilometers), tying 2008, 2010 and 2025 for the 10th-lowest minimum in the satellite record.

In August 2026, an iceberg the size of Manhattan broke away from the Petermann Ice Shelf in northern Greenland. It was the glacier's largest calving event since 2020. Long before the breakup, CIRES scientists were developing a new method to understand the planet's first known ice shelf estuary on the Petermann Ice Shelf.

In 2022, the eruption and collapse of an underwater volcano in Tonga caused a devastating tsunami that killed four people, disrupted seafloor ecosystems and damaged critical seafloor telecommunications cables. It was one of the most powerful volcanic events this century.

You might think the length of a day never varies—exactly 24 hours. You'd be wrong, at least if you count days in milliseconds, as physicists do.

The bright orange plumes of water scientists first noticed billowing across a river in Alaska's Brooks Range in 2018 were even more acidic and metallic than water leached from metal mines, despite their pristine surroundings. That's according to a new University of California, Davis, study of six affected watersheds.

Solar farms built around China's Gobi Desert could have the unexpected benefit of reducing the dust pollution reaching cities across northern China.

In some parts of the world, the sea barely rises and falls with the tides. In others, the difference between high and low tide is dramatic. Along Western Australia's Kimberley coast, for example, it can exceed 10 meters (33 feet)—roughly the height of a three-story building.

Magma moving beneath a volcano can make the ground rise, sink or shift sideways. Measuring these changes gives scientists clues about where magma is stored and how it travels. A study published in Geodesy and Geodynamics used satellite radar to examine the November 2025 eruption of Hayli Gubbi in Ethiopia's Afar Depression. Hayli Gubbi and nearby Erta Ale are separate volcanoes within the same volcanic zone, where three tectonic plates are pulling apart.

New research from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in collaboration with other institutions, highlights the fragmented and staggered timing of warming increases across the planet, providing a nuanced perspective on the debate over global-warming acceleration.