http://www.sciencedaily.com/news/earth_climate/ Earth Science News. From earthquakes and hurricanes to global warming and energy use, read the latest research news here. en-us Sat, 04 Jul 2009 04:05:01 EDT Sat, 04 Jul 2009 04:05:01 EDT 60 http://www.sciencedaily.com/images/logosmall.gif http://www.sciencedaily.com/news/earth_climate/ For more science articles, visit ScienceDaily. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090617123429.htm To better understand increasingly prevelant Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI) fires -- and how best to prevent or fight them -- researchers have issued an in-depth case study on fire behavior and defensive actions taken in a community during a major WUI fire in California. Sat, 04 Jul 2009 11:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090617123429.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702140845.htm Milder winters are causing Scotland's wild breed of Soay sheep to get smaller, despite the evolutionary benefits of possessing a large body, according to new research. Sat, 04 Jul 2009 05:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702140845.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702110501.htm Hurricane Katrina was the largest natural disaster in US history, claiming the lives of more than 1,800 victims and causing well over $100 billion in damage along the Gulf Coast. The 2005 storm breached every levee in New Orleans, flooding almost the entire city as well as the neighboring parishes. Yet a surprising number of people stayed behind and rode out the storm. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 20:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702110501.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702140835.htm A new study suggests that the form of El Nino may be changing potentially causing not only a greater number of hurricanes than in average years, but also a greater chance of hurricanes making landfall. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702140835.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702132825.htm The forests of the Pacific Northwest hold significant potential to increase carbon storage and help mitigate greenhouse gas emissions in coming years, a recent study concludes, if they are managed primarily for that purpose through timber harvest reductions and increased rotation ages. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702132825.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702170131.htm Intelligent countryside management could improve the survival chances of animal and plant species threatened by climate change. The creation of small heat-shielded habitats and better links between habitats would counteract a moderate temperature increase, and give threatened species more time to adapt better and/or to migrate to cooler regions. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 02:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702170131.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090703091808.htm China is in a very seismically active area and has had many catastrophic earthquakes during its history. A joint European-Chinese team is using satellite radar data to monitor ground deformation across major continental faults in China to understand better the seismic cycle and how faults behave. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090703091808.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090627225307.htm "June is busting out all over," as the song says, and with it, U.S. residents along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts begin to gaze warily toward the ocean, aware that the hurricane season is revving up. In the decade since NASA's QuikScat satellite and its SeaWinds scatterometer launched in June 1999, the satellite has measured the wind speed and wind direction of these powerful storms, providing data that are increasingly used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Hurricane Center and other world forecasting agencies. The data help scientists detect these storms, understand their wind fields, estimate their intensity and track their movement. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 23:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090627225307.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203456.htm Large volcanic calderas, aka supervolcanoes, are enormous craters tens of kilometers in diameter produced by giant, explosive eruptions that rank among the most violent geologic events. Geophysical studies of recently active calderas and investigations of their eruption products suggest that their magmatic systems are driven by intrusion of mantle-derived basalt in the deep crust, a process commonly referred to as magmatic underplating. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 23:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203456.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701102900.htm New research, which reconstructs the extent of ice in the sea between Greenland and Svalbard from the 13th century to the present indicates that there has never been so little sea ice as there is now. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 17:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701102900.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090625111431.htm When humans and animals delay reproduction because food or other resources are scarce, they may live longer to increase the impact of reproduction, according to a new study. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 14:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090625111431.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701150849.htm Scientists are researching the potential of mass production of microalgae as a crop. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 14:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701150849.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630205159.htm Is it possible that something as insubstantial and transitory as snow could be responsible for large scale vertical movements of Earth's surface and the excavation of deeply incised gorges? Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630205159.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630204755.htm Two Australian researchers have defined a newly recognized kind of explosive eruption, termed "neptunian," that is restricted to seafloor volcanoes. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 08:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630204755.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203955.htm Microbes and bacteria were the first living organisms on Earth, and they can be preserved in Archean silica-rich rocks. One such outcrop from western Australia, dated to 3.5 billion years ago, may hold the oldest "microfossils." Thu, 02 Jul 2009 05:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203955.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701131307.htm When glaciers advanced over much of the Earth's surface during the last ice age, what kept the planet from freezing over entirely? This has been a puzzle to climate scientists because leading models have indicated that over the past 24 million years geological conditions should have caused carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere to plummet, possibly leading to runaway "icehouse" conditions. Now researchers report on the missing piece of the puzzle -- plants. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 02:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701131307.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203041.htm The late Pliocene onset of major Northern Hemisphere glaciation is one of the most important steps in the Cenozoic global cooling. Although most attempts have been focused on high-latitude climate feedbacks, no consensus has been reached in explaining the forcing mechanism of this dramatic climate change. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 02:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203041.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702170128.htm Previous studies have suggested that Indonesia's Toba supervolcano, when it erupted about 74,000 years ago, triggered a 1,000-year episode of ice sheet advance, and also may have produced a short-lived "volcanic winter," which drastically reduced the human population at the time. Researchers have now found that none of the models to simulate the supervolcanic eruption initiate glaciation. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702170128.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702110459.htm As flowering plants like giant trees quickly rose to dominate plant communities during the Cretaceous period, the ferns that had preceded them hardly saw it as a disappointment. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702110459.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080525.htm Viruses can cost winegrowers an entire harvest. If they infest the grapevines, even pesticides are often no use. What’s more, these chemicals are harmful to the environment. Researchers are growing plants that produce antibodies against the viruses and are thus immune. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080525.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080354.htm Researchers have drawn together 200 years' worth of oceanographic knowledge to investigate the distribution of a notorious deep-sea giant - the king crab. The results reveal temperature as a driving force behind the divergence of a major seafloor predator; globally, and over tens of millions of years of Earth's history. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080354.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080121.htm The ability of plants to tell the time, a mechanism common to all living beings, enables them to survive, grow and reproduce. Scientists have studied this circadian clock from a molecular viewpoint and has found an ecological implication: it makes climate change scenarios and carbon dioxide level figures more accurate. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080121.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080116.htm New developments in a substance which emits brilliant light could lead to a revolution in lighting for the home and office in five years, claims a leading UK materials scientist. The source of the huge potential he foresees, gallium nitride (GaN), is already used for some lighting applications such as camera flashes, bicycle lights, mobile phones and interior lighting for buses, trains and planes. It could reduce the typical electricity consumption for lighting of a developed country by around 75% while delivering major cuts in carbon dioxide emissions from power stations, and preserving fossil fuel reserves. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702080116.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090626091140.htm The recent increase in area burned by wildfires in the Western United States is a product not of higher temperatures or longer fire seasons alone, but a complex relationship between climate and fuels that varies among different ecosystems, according to a new study. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090626091140.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203756.htm For the first time, the boundary between fungi and rock has been imaged on a nanoscale -- unraveling the fundamental processes by which fungi break down rocks into soil whilst extracting essential nutrients. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 17:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630203756.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090601111948.htm Changes in ocean chemistry -- a consequence of increased carbon dioxide emissions from human industrial activity -- could cause US shellfish revenues to drop significantly in the next 50 years, according to a new study. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 05:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090601111948.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090622171408.htm Oceanographers have found so few organisms beneath the seafloor that it may be the least inhabited sediment ever explored for evidence of life. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 05:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090622171408.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701163647.htm Home gardeners beware: This year, late blight -- a destructive infectious disease that caused the Irish potato famine in the 1840s -- is killing tomato and potato plants in gardens and on commercial farms in the eastern United States. In addition, basil downy mildew is affecting plants in the Northeast. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701163647.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701135535.htm The rain band near the equator that determines the supply of freshwater to nearly a billion people throughout the tropics and subtropics has been creeping north for more than 300 years. If the band continues to migrate at just less than a mile a year, which is the average for all the years it has been moving north, then some Pacific islands near the equator may be starved of freshwater by midcentury or sooner. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701135535.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701102904.htm Researchers have managed to make out the "self-irrigating" mechanism of the desert rhubarb, which enables it to harvest 16 times the amount of water than otherwise expected for a plant in this region based on the quantities of rain in the desert. This is the first example of a self-irrigating plant worldwide. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701102904.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701082905.htm Extinction looms for amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds restricted to declining mangrove forests. Substantial numbers of terrestrial vertebrates are restricted to mangrove forests. Many of these specialized species are listed as threatened by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. Prospects for mangrove-restricted animals are bleak, because more than two percent of mangrove forests are lost each year. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701082905.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630075317.htm The blooming of toxic algae that occurs during the summer conceal a fight for life and death. Scientists now propose that algal blooms are created when aggressive algae kill and injure their competitors in order to absorb the nutrients they contain. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 23:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630075317.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090629081127.htm Plants grown under high carbon dioxide and drought conditions show an increase in toxic compounds, a decrease in protein content and a decrease in yield. Therefore new cultivars should be developed in order to sustain food production in a future environment. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 20:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090629081127.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090622165924.htm Scientists in China are recommending that the Chinese government consider phasing out the direct burning of traditional chunks of coal in millions of households. It suggests that the government substitute coal briquettes and improved stoves for cooking and heating to help reduce the country's high air pollution levels. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 17:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090622165924.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090629200802.htm People are more likely to enroll in conservation programs if their neighbors do -- a tendency that should be exploited when it comes to protecting the environment, according to results of a new study. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090629200802.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090616144533.htm In revisiting a chemical reaction that's been in the literature for several decades and adding a new wrinkle of their own, researchers have discovered a mild and relatively inexpensive procedure for removing oxygen from biomass. This procedure, if it can be effectively industrialized, could allow many of today's petrochemical products, including plastics, to instead be made from biomass. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090616144533.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090629200808.htm Particulate pollution thought to be holding climate change in check by reflecting sunlight instead enhances warming when combined with airborne soot. An instrument that measures the chemical composition and optical properties of aerosols in real time has revealed that fresh soot quickly becomes coated with a spherical shell of other chemicals, such as sulfate and nitrate through light-driven chemical reactions. This lens-like shell enhances absorption of light by a factor of 1.6 over pure soot particles. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 05:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090629200808.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615171612.htm Contrary to common belief, Brazil's policy of protecting portions of the Amazonian forest from development is capable of buffering the Amazon from climate change, according to a new study. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 05:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615171612.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615111755.htm New research shows that health-related loss in modern salmon farming may be systematically monitored and quantified, both in biological and economical terms. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 02:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615111755.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090703065515.htm The first home in the UK which can learn from its residents and take decisive action and text if it is being burgled or the door has been left unlocked, will be unveiled this week in Cairo. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090703065515.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701190414.htm Declining bumblebee populations are at greater risk of inbreeding, which can trigger a downward spiral of further decline. Researchers have provided the first proof that inbreeding reduces colony fitness under natural conditions by increasing the production of reproductively inefficient 'diploid' males. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701190414.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630163631.htm Individuals prefer to be involved in a collective contribution to green electricity that involve everyone paying more, rather than having individual higher bills. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630163631.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630132103.htm The potential of forest biotechnology to help address significant social and environmental issues is being "strangled at birth" by the rigid opposition of some groups and regulations that effectively preclude even the testing of genetically modified trees, scientists argue in a new report. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630132103.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630132005.htm The vast amount of carbon stored in the Arctic and boreal regions of the world is more than double that previously estimated, according to a new study. The new estimate is over 1.5 trillion tons of frozen carbon, about twice as much carbon as contained in the atmosphere. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630132005.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630074951.htm Researchers subjected species found in Antarctic waters to increasing levels of water temperature to learn how well they would cope with a warmer ocean. The study shows that several of these species are already living really close to their upper temperature range, and that further increases could easily provoke serious ecological imbalances in this region. Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630074951.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615111618.htm For the first time, scientists in Germany successfully used an offshore observing system to study environmental changes in the oceans. The so-called mesocosms resemble oversized test tubes with a length of 20 metres. They are used to simulate the future ocean in situ, i.e. under realistic conditions. Mon, 29 Jun 2009 23:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615111618.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615171523.htm American researchers who have been studying the rare and threatened bonobo ape will lead monitoring efforts after a group of orphan bonobos are returned to the wild in the Congo for the first time this month. Mon, 29 Jun 2009 20:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090615171523.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090623120846.htm Scientists are warning that a new form of unregulated whaling has emerged along the coastlines of Japan and South Korea, where the commercial sale of whales killed as fisheries "bycatch" is threatening coastal stocks of minke whales and other protected species. Mon, 29 Jun 2009 11:00:00 EDT http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090623120846.htm