Earth Sciences

By summer 2005, researchers in the Fluids Research Laboratory at Virginia Tech will be able to look for evidence of water on Mars by examining submicroscopic bubbles in martian meteorites, determine whether fluids and silicate melts trapped in volcanic rock can help predict future eruptions, and locate buried mineral deposits using data from surface rocks. Robert Bodnar, University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Geosciences in the College of Science, has received equipment grants from t

Instantaneous ice ages, grapefruit-size hail and tidal waves – all courtesy of global warming – are being served up as Memorial Day weekend entertainment in movie theaters.

The side order: A little scientific food for thought.

“The Day After Tomorrow,” a star-studded movie that paints a vivid picture of global climatic catastrophe, is a simplistic look at the complex and real issue of a potential outcome of global warming, said David Skole, professor and director of MSU’s Center for

Some erupted more often, others less often after big jolt 2,000 miles distant

A powerful earthquake that rocked Alaska in 2002 not only triggered small earthquakes almost 2,000 miles away at Wyoming’s Yellowstone National Park – as was reported at the time – but also changed the timing and behavior of some of Yellowstone’s geysers and hot springs, a new study says.

“We did not expect to see these prolonged changes in the hydrothermal system,” says University of Uta

According to a new NASA-funded study, insights into Earth’s climate may come from an unlikely place: the moon.

Scientists looked at the ghostly glow of light reflected from Earth onto the moon’s dark side. During the 1980s and 1990s, Earth bounced less sunlight out to space. The trend reversed during the past three years, as the Earth appears to reflect more light toward space.

Though not fully understood, the shifts may indicate a natural variability of clouds, w

Carbon dioxide and oxygen, not methane, were prevalent in the Earth’s atmosphere more than 1.8 billion years ago as shown by the absence of siderite in ancient soils but the abundance of the mineral in ocean sediments from that time, according to a Penn State geochemist.

“The absence of siderite in some ancient soils has been linked to low carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, levels that would be too low to compensate for the cooler sun 2.2 billion years ago,” says Dr. Hiroshi Ohmot

The response of glaciers to global warming is an important element in understanding climate change, involving sea-level change and changes to the thermohaline circulation in the North Atlantic. To predict changes in the future it is vital to understand the behaviour of the sub-glacial bed. But reliable data is a prerequisite.

In the first investigation of its kind in the world the University of Southampton’s interdisciplinary GLACSWEB team is recording glacier behaviour through a network of