Phys.org: Earth science

Researchers at the Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research have investigated how water from streams can be stored in the aquifer during wet periods. Using an area in the lower Spree catchment in Brandenburg as an example, the team used a computer model to show that naturally occurring small basins in the landscape could absorb excess stream water, allowing it to seep slowly into the ground and subsequently stabilize groundwater and connected surface water bodies. In the calculations, the groundwater level rose locally by up to 2 meters (6.6 feet). Water flow in connected streams could be increased by up to 15%. The study was published in the Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies.

Most people have experienced a heat wave on land. But heat waves can strike in the ocean too. And as the planet continues to warm, marine heat waves are growing longer and deadlier, hurting the seafood supply that billions of people worldwide rely on for their food and livelihoods.

During an abrupt global cold snap nearly 13,000 years ago, the Gulf Stream ocean current shifted farther north, temporarily disrupting eastern Canada's oceanic ecosystems, a process that could happen again as the climate changes, a new study by UCL researchers finds.

Hilly and mountainous landscapes have a much greater ability to store carbon in the soil than previously thought, according to a new study co-led by scientists at the University of Oregon.

The temperature of rivers is something most people think about only if they plan to go swimming, kayaking or spend a day fishing. Few consider how it could potentially affect their electricity bill.

Nitrate pollution is a growing global environmental challenge due to the extensive use of fertilizer. A study published in Science, led by the Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB) with the Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research (UFZ), shows that both the amount of water moving through landscapes and how fast it moves play a key role in nitrogen pollution risk.

In a new study, Professor Shin Sugiyama of Hokkaido University and his team have directly confirmed for the first time that water from melting snow and ice, or meltwater, found at the surface of a glacier can drain to its base, causing glaciers in Antarctica to speed up and move toward the ocean.

New research shows surface melting across Antarctica is set to intensify and spread dramatically over the 21st century, with melt increasing 10-fold and the affected area growing by more than 10% by 2100 if global temperatures continue to rise.

Planetary heating is intensifying and key climate indicators are deteriorating, top scientists said Thursday, warning that funding decisions affecting Earth observation systems in the United States and other countries threaten efforts to track global warming.

In 2023, Cyclone Gabrielle triggered an estimated 800,000 landslides across the North Island, making it one of the most extreme landslide events ever recorded. New research by Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha | University of Canterbury (UC) and Earth Sciences New Zealand suggests that under a warmer climate, future storms similar to Cyclone Gabrielle could be even more extreme, triggering tens of thousands more landslides across parts of the North Island and highlighting the need for targeted planning in vulnerable areas.

A new study finds that burning 500,000 acres (202,000 hectares) of California conifer forests each year with prescribed fire could cut deadly pollution from wildfire smoke by roughly 10% over a decade.

In a new paper published in Science, leading scientists and climate policy experts show that 15% of current global warming (0.3°C) from human emissions stems from pollutants that fall outside most existing climate policy frameworks. Most of these overlooked pollutants are called "indirect greenhouse gases" and include carbon monoxide, non-methane volatile organic compounds, nitrogen oxides and molecular hydrogen.

Researchers combining two methods to reconstruct the rupture evolution of the July 2025 magnitude 8.8 Kamchatka earthquake found the rupture from the megathrust event extended about 500 kilometers (311 miles) from its epicenter.

Climate change could make historically rare tropical storms in Southern California produce significantly more precipitation in the next few decades, and when they strike, landslides are likely to become a bigger risk across the region, according to new research in Nature Climate Change.

Strong and consistent evidence shows that the entire climate system is continuing to heat, driving rapid global warming. Human activities pushed global warming to 1.37°C in 2025, and its level is projected to surpass 1.5°C in about four years. Crucially, the rate at which heat is accumulating in Earth's system suggests high levels of future warming. These are some of the key findings from the latest Indicators of Global Climate Change (IGCC) report, published in Earth System Science Data.

For almost a century, researchers have known that vertical land motion—the lifting and sinking of the ground—affects sea level locally. As the ground sinks, the sea level rises relative to the land. Scientists also assumed this process generally occurred at a steady rate over time. But a research team that includes Thomas Wahl, a UCF researcher and associate professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Construction Engineering, has found that ground subsidence has undergone phases of variable change, creating significant implications for coastal communities.

A brown mass—a mixture of water, boulders and fine matter—plows through the landscape. The mountains wash more than a thousand lorryloads of material into the valley on a fairly regular basis, causing damage in excess of CHF 100 million per year in Switzerland alone. A better understanding of this natural hazard requires data from the debris flow channels, of which there is very little because of the complex surveying process.

Ice-age sea-level declines may have turned seafloor volcanoes into natural iron fertilizer for plankton, potentially enhancing ocean carbon storage, Boston College researchers report in the journal Nature Geoscience.

The quest to identify a new way to potentially counter one of the world's most widely discussed solar geoengineering proposals has taken a new, exciting turn—raising questions about how future climate interventions could be governed.

Human-caused sea-level rise has significantly increased the frequency of extreme coastal flooding worldwide, according to a new study led by a Tulane University researcher. The research, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, found that coastal flooding events expected only once every 100 years are now, on average, about 12 times more likely to occur.