Phys.org: Earth science

For communities living in the shadow of a volcano, early warning systems are a lifeline—but mistrust in these warnings can have deadly consequences. To avoid false alarms, it is vital that scientists seek more reliable ways to monitor volcanoes.

Imagine a natural fortress standing strong against raging storms. That's what mangroves and other forested wetlands do for our coastlines. But how well do they protect us, and against which storms?

Between 252 and 66 million years ago, the ocean underwent a revolution. That's when plankton with calcium carbonate skeletons colonized the open ocean. When they died, their remains fell like snow over large parts of the seafloor. The abundance of their skeletons over time changed the marine landscape, leading to unique rock formations and vast deposits of carbonate rock.

Analyzing lava flows that solidified and then broke apart over a massive crack in Earth's crust in Turkey has brought new insights into how continents move over time, improving our understanding of earthquake risks.

As droughts worsen and water shortages hit communities worldwide, a new study in the journal Decision Analysis has uncovered a smarter way to get people to save water—without breaking the bank.

Geologists led by the University of Maryland and the University of Hawaiʻi finally connected the dots between one of the largest volcanic eruptions in Earth's history and its source deep beneath the Pacific Ocean.

Hundreds of millions of people live in areas that could be affected by volcanic eruptions. Fortunately, clues at the surface, such as earthquakes and ground deformation, can indicate movement within underground magma dikes—sheets of magma that cut across layers of rock. Scientists can use these clues to make potentially lifesaving predictions of eruptions.

Volcanoes erupting underwater have a distinctive effect on the climate that is larger and more widespread than previously thought, according to an international group led by University of Auckland and Tongan scientists. Research on Tonga's devastating 2022 Hunga eruption has just been published in the journal Nature Geoscience.

A new study led by Prof. Li Zhi from the Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has revealed a troubling global increase in snow droughts under different climate scenarios. The findings were recently published in Geophysical Research Letters.

About 240 miles long, Utah's Wasatch Fault stretches along the western edge of the Wasatch Mountains from southern Idaho to central Utah, running through Salt Lake City and the state's other population centers. It's a seismically active normal fault, which means it is a fracture in Earth's crust that has moved many times in the past.

The ocean's deep-sea bed is scattered with ancient rocks, each about the size of a closed fist, called "polymetallic nodules." Elsewhere, along active and inactive hydrothermal vents and the deep ocean's ridges, volcanic arcs, and tectonic plate boundaries, and on the flanks of seamounts, lie other types of mineral-rich deposits containing high-demand minerals.

Increasing the natural uptake of carbon dioxide by the ocean or storing captured CO₂ under the seabed are currently being discussed in Germany as potential ways to offset unavoidable residual emissions and achieve the country's goal of greenhouse gas neutrality by 2045.

The history of metal pollution in the city of São Paulo, the largest metropolis in Brazil and the Southern Hemisphere, can be read in the layers of sediment accumulated over the last century.

We've discovered that a meteorite struck northwest Scotland 1 billion years ago, 200 million years later than previously thought. Our results are published today in the journal Geology.

Volatiles are crucial for sustaining life and Earth's habitability, with subduction zones being the main pathways for these materials to enter the mantle. However, the devolatilization of subducting slabs may impede the recycling of volatiles like carbon. Boron, a moderately volatile element with strong fluid mobility, serves as a useful tracer for tracking the recycling of volatiles through its isotopic composition (δ¹¹B).

New Curtin University research has revealed that a massive meteorite struck northwestern Scotland about 200 million years later than previously thought, in a discovery that not only rewrites Scotland's geological history but alters our understanding of the evolution of non-marine life on Earth.

Scientists believe they have found a way to improve warning systems for vulnerable communities threatened by humid heat waves, which are on the rise due to climate change and can be damaging and even fatal to human health.

On New Year's Day 2024, a massive 7.5-magnitude earthquake struck the Noto Peninsula in north central Japan, resulting in extensive damage in the region caused by uplift, when the land rises due to shifting tectonic plates. The observed uplift, however, varied significantly, with some areas experiencing as much as a 5-meter rise in the ground surface.

The Antarctic Peninsula, one of the fastest-warming regions on Earth, has seen temperatures rise five times faster than the global average in recent decades. Extreme heat events, such as the record-breaking 20.8° C recorded at Seymour Island in February 2020, have raised urgent questions about the drivers behind these dramatic changes.

Climate change is increasing the risk of wildfires in many regions of the world. This is due partly to specific weather conditions—known as fire weather—that facilitate the spread of wildfires.