Phys.org: Earth science

An unusual reduction in the strength of Earth's magnetic field between 591 and 565 million years ago coincided with a significant increase in the oxygen levels in the atmosphere and oceans, according to a paper published in Communications Earth & Environment. The authors propose that the weakening of the magnetic field may have led to the increase in oxygen, which is believed to have supported the evolution of some of the earliest complex organisms.

A team of paleoclimatologists with the U.S. Geological Survey, NASA Ames Research Park, has found that atmospheric rivers in the past have dumped far more rain on California than those that have occurred over the past two years.

In early spring, George Okoko was perched on a ledge 15 feet up a crumbly cliff, trying to whack off a basketball-size piece of rock with a hammer and chisel. The locale was suburban Berkeley Heights, N.J. The rock was basalt, a common product of volcanism. This batch formed some 200 million years ago, during vast eruptions that occurred as Europe slowly tore away from North America, creating a chasm that became the Atlantic Ocean.

Climate change is transforming dust storms—a natural phenomenon in the Middle East—into a more frequent and widespread threat to health and economies throughout the region, a new study shows.

The Colorado River's future may be a little brighter than expected, according to a new modeling study from CIRES researchers. Warming temperatures, which deplete water in the river, have raised doubts the Colorado River could recover from a multi-decade drought. The new study fully accounts for both rising temperatures and precipitation in the Colorado's headwaters, and finds precipitation, not temperature, will likely continue to dictate the flow of the river for the next 25 years.

Researchers have discovered the missing piece of the puzzle behind a rare opening in the sea ice around Antarctica, which was nearly twice the size of Wales and occurred during the winters of 2016 and 2017.

A new study by Northwestern University researchers and coworkers explains a puzzling problem with maps of future earthquake shaking used to design earthquake-resistant buildings. The research was published May 1 in the journal Science Advances in a paper titled "Why do seismic hazard maps worldwide appear to overpredict historical intensity observations?"

Earth System Models—complex computer models that describe Earth processes and how they interact—are critical for predicting future climate change. By simulating the response of our land, oceans and atmosphere to manmade greenhouse gas emissions, these models form the foundation for predictions of future extreme weather and climate event scenarios, including those issued by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The pace of discovery in the oceans leaped forward thanks to teamwork between a deep-sea robot and a human occupied submarine leading to the recent discovery of five new hydrothermal vents in the eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean.

Current concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in Earth's atmosphere are unprecedented in human history. But CO₂ levels today, and those that might occur in coming decades, did occur millions of years ago.

An SMU-led research team has found that ancient rocks and fossils from long-extinct marine reptiles in Angola clearly show a key part of Earth's past—the splitting of South America and Africa and the subsequent formation of the South Atlantic Ocean.

A small team of oceanographers from several institutions in Mexico has found evidence that the Taam Ja' Blue Hole in Mexico's Chetumal Bay, on the eastern side of the Yucatán Peninsula, is the deepest in the world. In their study published in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science, the group made a dive deep into the hole along with a conductivity, temperature and depth profiler.

A new analysis of cloud measurements from outside the coast of California, combined with global satellite measurements, reveals that even aerosol particles as small as 25–30 nanometers may contribute to cloud formation. Hence, the climate impact of small aerosols may be underestimated.

Every Thursday at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time, the U.S. Drought Monitor (USDM) publishes a map of drought conditions across the United States. Established in 2000, the USDM combines measurements of physical variables like soil moisture and runoff with reports of drought effects like fallow fields and reductions in municipal water supply.

The link between massive flood basalt volcanism and the end-Triassic (201 million years ago) mass extinction is commonly accepted. However, exactly how volcanism led to the collapse of ecosystems and the extinction of entire families of organisms is difficult to establish.

The past 10 years have seen a series of "warm blobs" in the northeast Pacific Ocean. These marine heat waves do widespread damage to ecosystems and marine life in the area, but the mechanisms by which they develop and are sustained are still uncertain. Now a research group has found that they are caused by climate "teleconnections" from wave trains that originate in the Mediterranean Sea and North Atlantic region.

In order to understand the Earth's resilience, researchers at ETH Zurich are modeling climate changes from times long past. And they show that plants are not simply victims of circumstances, but have helped to shape climate conditions on Earth.

According to a recent study published in Nature Geoscience, scientists have found that soil carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are more sensitive to climate warming in permafrost-collapsed areas than in non-collapsed areas.

The return of spring in the Northern Hemisphere touches off tornado season. A tornado's twisting funnel of dust and debris seems an unmistakable sight. But that sight can be obscured to radar, the tool of meteorologists. It's hard to know exactly when a tornado has formed, or even why.

As the impacts of climate change increasingly affect the daily lives of residents in several countries, including Brazil, the resilience of forests, especially tropical ones such as the Amazon, has become a frequent topic of research. In addition to studying various factors that influence the way vegetation reacts to global warming, scientists are seeking to improve vegetation models—tools that play a crucial role in understanding and managing ecosystems, contributing to biodiversity conservation and sustainable development.