Phys.org: Earth science

Carbon sequestration, climate regulation, biodiversity support and shoreline protection: These are all benefits provided by tidal wetlands. As the climate changes, the amount of carbon captured by these vital ecosystems may be changing as well.

Researchers have long known that there is an asymmetry in the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the confluence of wind and water currents that creates warm El Niño events and cooler La Niña events. Large-scale climate models tend to underrepresent this asymmetry for reasons that are still not fully understood. Better modeling of the mechanisms that make El Niño events warmer could both provide insight into Earth's climate system and improve future ENSO predictions.

Water flowing from hot springs near volcanoes often contains a mixture of meteoric water that has percolated underground and a deeper component known as magmatic water. Researchers at the University of Tsukuba used numerical simulations and isotopic data to show that magmatic water in hot springs and volcanic gases around Kussharo Caldera, Hokkaido, originates from the subducting Pacific Plate, which descends from the Kuril Trench to a depth of 125 kilometers (78 miles). The paper is published in the Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research.

For U.S. coastal residents, storm surge is among the deadliest hurricane hazards, causing catastrophic property damage and loss of life, and scientists expect tropical storms to grow more intense. During Hurricane Ian in 2022, storm surge accounted for 41 of the 66 direct deaths. The 2026 Atlantic hurricane season is now underway, and while NOAA expects below-normal activity, emergency managers caution that it only takes one storm to devastate a community.

In November 2025, a study led by Adrien Wehrlé, a researcher in the Department of Geography at the University of Zürich, Switzerland, looked at the massive calving response of one of West Greenland's active glaciers, Sermeq Kujalleq in the Kangia icefjord (SKK), to the drainage of two surface lakes. Called supraglacial lakes, these are temporary meltwater ponds that form and accumulate in depressions or holes on the surface of glaciers and ice sheets.

Geologists studying some of the planet's oldest volcanic rocks have uncovered new evidence that water was playing a major role in shaping Earth's interior and driving volcanic activity more than 3 billion years ago.

Tyler Spano's impact on the field of mineralogy is anything but small. So when a newly discovered mineral, modest in size but significant in meaning, was named spanoite in her honor, it became a fitting tribute to her contributions to the field.

Researchers at University of Tsukuba analyzed high-resolution topographic data from airborne LiDAR to examine the relationships among landslide area, depth, and slope gradient.

East Antarctica hosts the largest ice sheet on Earth, containing enough water to raise global sea levels by 52 meters (171 feet) were it to fully melt. Yet scientists have been puzzled for decades about how and why this ice sheet formed.

In May 2018, the island of Mayotte, between Madagascar and Mozambique, began to experience a series of earthquakes that led to the discovery of an underwater volcano, now called Fani Maoré. Multiple scientific expeditions followed, taking samples of the recently erupted lava. When a team of researchers analyzed 13 samples from Fani Maoré and eight additional samples from eastern Mayotte, they discovered remnants of a mineral called bridgmanite that they believe came from Earth's earliest geologic time period, the Hadean eon. Their findings were recently published in Nature.

The state of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) has been a hot topic among climate scientists in recent years. The AMOC is crucial for climate regulation because it pulls warm surface water from the tropics north and sends colder, deeper water south, redistributing large amounts of heat, helping to sustain marine ecosystems and keeping global weather patterns steady. However, most standard AMOC-focused climate models may be missing an important piece of the puzzle—they don't include the growing pulse of freshwater from Greenland ice melt, which could further disrupt the AMOC.

Tropical moist forests account for 70% of global living biomass. Deforestation and degradation—that is, the partial damage to tree stands—as well as the subsequent regeneration of forests therefore play a pivotal role in the global carbon cycle. While the effects of large-scale tropical deforestation are well understood, the impacts of forest degradation have remained highly uncertain until now.

The Southern Ocean has long stood out as an oddity in the global climate system. While most of the planet's surface oceans have warmed in response to rising greenhouse gases, waters circling Antarctica showed an unexpected tendency to cool during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This cooling coincided with a period when Antarctic sea ice briefly expanded before its more recent decline, adding to the mystery.

Every summer, communities across northern Australia brace for the tropical cyclone season. Tropical cyclones draw their power from the warm seas, extracting heat and moisture from ocean water.

Europe's summer heat wave has exposed tens of millions of people to temperatures above 35°C, broken records and claimed hundreds of lives. Early climate attribution studies suggest Europe's event would have been "virtually impossible" just 50 years ago without human-caused climate change.

The Congo River is the second-largest river in the world, releasing an average of 40,000 cubic meters of water per second into the Atlantic Ocean. This huge discharge rate creates a large plume of fresh water that fans out 800 kilometers (500 miles) offshore.

When NASA's Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System, or CYGNSS, launched into orbit in 2016, none of the University of Michigan Engineering researchers who developed the system expected it to transform earth science. They certainly had high hopes for the system's original mission to improve hurricane forecasting, but its ability to pick up reflected GPS signals also proved useful for much more.

Many of the boulders scattered across the Swiss landscape did not originate where they now stand. Instead, they were carried by ice nearly 24,000 years ago. For the first time, researchers at the University of Lausanne (UNIL) have reconstructed the journeys of these giant rocks across the entire Alpine region using a simulation. The model makes it possible to visualize the paths taken by millions of rocks that helped shape today's landscapes.

Prescribed fires are vital for reducing wildfire risk and sustaining forest biodiversity. But they also contribute significantly to air pollution and smoke exposure, according to new research from the University of Georgia. The issue is especially pertinent to the southeastern United States, where 60% of all prescribed fires in the country occur. More than 20% of the fine-particle pollution in the southeastern U.S. can be attributed to prescribed burns, the study found.

One seismometer is often not enough to reliably detect earthquakes or human activity such as underground nuclear tests. Rather, researchers combine readings from seismometers distributed across a small geographic area to gain confidence in their analysis. Artificial intelligence (AI) can combine readings from multiple sensors more effectively than classic technology, enabling more reliable detection of weak seismic signals, a new study by A. Köhler and colleagues shows.