Search Results for: ocean

Global warming may proceed faster and be more severe than previously predicted according to research about to be published in the scientific journal “Nature”. Reductions in airborne particle pollution, or aerosols, as air quality is improved, will amplify climate change by reducing the cooling effect due to aerosols and also by increasing the amount of carbon dioxide that remains in the atmosphere. Uncertainty about the magnitude of past and present cooling, however, means that we cannot be cert

Physiology is sometimes a crossroads where many different paths converge. Such is the case with acute respiratory distress syndrome, a severe and often fatal condition also known as adult respiratory distress syndrome or simply “shock lung.”

Acute respiratory distress syndrome can be caused by a number of underlying conditions, including smoke inhalation, a severe blow to the chest, bad pneumonia, septic shock, severe blood loss, or drug overdose. Although the causes vary greatly, t

El Niño and La Niña play with the populations of microscopic ocean plants called phytoplankton. That’s what scientists have found using NASA satellite data and a computer model.

Phytoplankton are the base of the marine food chain, providing food for little sea animals called zooplankton, which in turn feed fish and other creatures. Any change in phytoplankton numbers alters the ocean food chain.

The computer model showed that during El Niño periods, warm waters fr

During the most recent period in Earth’s past with a climate warmer than today, the tropical Pacific was in a stable state of El Niño-like conditions, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Whether this represents a likely scenario for the future, given the current rise in global temperatures, is uncertain. Nevertheless, the study has important implications for scientists trying to understand the global climate system and how it mi

Global warming could result in northern Europe growing colder as the southern hemisphere gets hotter, according to new research led by the University of Edinburgh. A study, based on analysis of changing climate patterns at the end of the last ice age, confounds the widely-held view that global warming will be uniform across the world. It also suggests that ice age conditions could return to the northern hemisphere sooner than was previously thought.

The research, which claims that

Billions of tonnes of sediment are clogging up the world’s coastal zones, rivers and estuaries with devastating results to the environment, say scientists attending an international meeting organised by the Land-Ocean Interactions in the Coastal Zone (LOICZ) project, a global network of coastal and marine scientists.

Nutrient-laden mud, gravel and sand, pushed downstream by large rivers and estuaries, are changing the shape of coastlines, destroying aquatic life and even filling u