El Niño transforms tropical forests from carbon sinks to sources. 2026 could be the worst year yet.
Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans, Volume 131, Issue 7, July 2026.
Thirty years after the European Space Agency first demonstrated the power of flying two satellites in very close formation, the concept was recently recreated. By temporarily positioning two Copernicus Sentinel-1 radar satellites to replicate the pioneering ERS-1–ERS-2 ‘tandem mission’, ESA achieved one-day repeat radar imaging of the same Antarctic region.The results once again demonstrate how this approach can be used to measure glacier motion and pinpoint the critical grounding line with exceptional precision.
Exclusive: ‘The preferred policy is, of course, a carbon price,’ Dr Huw McKay says, amid slowdown in BHP action on emissions Get our breaking news email , free app or daily news podcast A former chief economist at mining company BHP says stronger climate policy by governments is needed to “move the needle” and incentivise tough decarbonisation decisions at major resource companies. Internal documents, leaked to Guardian Australia and the ABC earlier this year, showed BHP had delayed vast renewables projects in the Pilbara, scrapped a project that would have delivered significant cuts to global emissions, and war-gamed options to push the electrification of its polluting diesel truck and train fleets into the next two decades. Continue reading...
The tech firm entered a 10-year agreement with Singapore-based carbon developer Thryve.Earth to purchase credits generated from an agroforestry project on the island of Sulawesi.
Researchers have pioneered a groundbreaking method that transforms organic waste into hydrogen fuel, while simultaneously generating protein suitable for aquaculture feed and calcium carbonate. This innovative technology aims to achieve a carbon-neutral process, capturing more carbon dioxide than it emits. Ongoing investigations are focused on potential commercial uses for this adaptable technology, though scaling up remains a notable hurdle to achieving widespread use.
Crude oil prices jumped and stock prices fell after President Trump declared an end to the ceasefire with Iran, adding fresh uncertainty to an already shaky outlook for the global economy.
An expedition almost 400 metres below the surface of the Labrador Sea is revealing the first images of Quest, the sunken wreck of the ship that carried famed Antarctic explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton on his final voyage.
Scientists tested spraying seawater onto Arctic ice, which showed promising initial results. The treated ice became thicker and more reflective, resisting summer melting effectively. This method offers an alternative to controversial geoengineering approaches for ice preservation. While promising, researchers note significant challenges for large-scale implementation across the Arctic. Further work is essential before this technique can be considered for broader application.
Learn how slow-moving mantle waves inside Earth may have lifted Antarctica’s ancient mountains, creating cold highlands where the Antarctic ice sheet could begin forming.
Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Volume 131, Issue 13, 16 July 2026.
The fate of the Atlantic Ocean current that keeps Europe’s climate warm depends on our carbon emissions and the rate of ice melt from Greenland, but there is a chance that a shutdown is already inevitable
Canada's defense tech startup, Dominion Dynamics, secured C$139 million in funding, aiming to bolster the nation's defense industry. CEO Eliot Pence believes public support for military investment is strong, driven by global tensions and a need for modern capabilities. The company focuses on Arctic technologies and advocates for faster procurement and a more experimental approach to defense innovation, emphasizing domestic production over mere purchasing.
Scientists have unearthed a colossal, fan-shaped geological formation hidden beneath East Antarctica's ice. This massive structure, dubbed the East Antarctic Fan-Shaped Basin Province, connects previously known underground basins, reshaping our understanding of ancient supercontinent Gondwana's breakup and Antarctica's ice sheet behavior amid climate change. The discovery reveals a more dynamic geological past for East Antarctica than previously believed.
Svalbard is warming faster than almost anywhere on Earth, but security concerns are tightening access to its glaciers, fjords, and sea floor
Human activity has driven retreat of one of Antarctica's most important glaciers British Antarctic Survey scientists have contributed to the first study to directly link the retreat of a major Antarctic glacier to human-caused climate change. The post Human activity has driven retreat of one of Antarctica’s most important glaciers appeared first on British Antarctic Survey.
Every year, farmers in India burn millions of tonnes of stalks, husks and other plant matter left after each harvest, a practice that has long contributed to South Asia’s toxic winter smog. But that agricultural waste – known as crop residue – could instead become a feedstock for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) for airlines around the world, according to a new study. SAF is a low-carbon alternative to conventional jet fuel, blending aviation turbine fuel with sustainably sourced raw...
Why Antarctica became glaciated ∼34 million years ago (Ma) remains debated, as relatively warm climates and sea temperatures appear inconsistent with ice sheet formation. Although a critical decline in CO2 is considered primarily responsible, evidence ...
Commercial LPG and aviation fuel prices have seen a significant drop, with state-run companies cutting prices by Rs 183.5 and Rs 5 respectively. This easing follows a decline in global crude prices and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. However, domestic LPG and petrol/diesel prices remain unchanged, as oil companies continue to absorb losses from earlier elevated crude bookings. Airfare relief is also unlikely due to ongoing airspace issues.
An ambitious expedition will use Canadian technology to revisit two legendary polar exploration shipwrecks. The goal: create detailed digital twins of Quest and Terra Nova while leaving the historic wrecks undisturbed on the sea floor.
A vertebra from the British Antarctic Survey collection has been recognized for what it is -- the first dinosaur fossil found in Antarctica.
Underwater expedition by Florida-based team supports possible therapeutic use of bacterial toxins from sea squirts Researchers at a Florida university say bacterial toxins produced by tiny marine organisms they have studied in Antarctica could become an effective treatment for melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. A team from the University of South Florida (USF) recently returned from a six-week expedition to one of the world’s remotest regions in which they collected samples of ascidians, invertebrates known as sea squirts that thrive in the icy waters. Continue reading...
A bone collected by British Antarctic Survey is the first dinosaur fossil ever found on the Antarctic continent. The post Antarctica’s first dinosaur fossil confirmed from 1985 Antarctic expedition appeared first on British Antarctic Survey.
The fossil, collected in Antarctica in 1985, is part of the tail of a beast called a Titanosaur.
Accumulation on Switzerland’s glaciers from last winter expected to all be gone by Monday amid ‘enormous’ melt rates across Alps Swiss glaciers are set to lose an enormous amount of ice due to the heatwave battering Europe, according to the head of Glacier Monitoring in Switzerland (Glamos). The snow and ice accumulated last winter by Switzerland’s glaciers is expected to have all melted away by Monday, marking the alarming second-earliest arrival on record of the tipping point known as glacier loss day. Continue reading...
Switzerland's glaciers are facing unprecedented melting, with "glacier loss day" arriving exceptionally early this year due to a prolonged European heatwave, warm May, and insufficient winter snowfall. Experts warn that this rapid ice loss, exacerbated by persistent high temperatures, mirrors the dire conditions of 2022 and threatens to leave only remnants of glaciers by 2100, impacting vital European river systems.
The first scientific ship built by private interests in China is still waiting for its first assignment after it launched last month near Wenling, in Zhejiang province, on the east coast, according to Chinese media reports. The 82 metre-long (269-foot), 3,500-tonne Haiying Jiake research vessel was built with 150 million yuan (US$22 million) raised by 37 Zhejiang fishermen. It is designed to operate anywhere in the world’s oceans, including in thin sea ice, and support research ranging from...
The terrifying jaws of an Ice Age super-predator are about to go under the hammer.
The loss of Antarctica’s doomsday glacier would transform our planet. Now scientists are revealing the secrets of this remotest of places, and asking the question: is its demise inevitable?
An instrument on the Perseverance rover has identified large, complex carbon compounds alongside unusual patterns on the surface of rocks that resemble traces of microbial activity
Plus, filming wraps on Panos Cosmatos' first film in eight years.
As extreme summer heat causes disruption across the UK and Europe this week, Midwinter at Antarctica’s Rothera Research Station is becoming increasingly unrecognisable. The post Think it’s hot here? The Antarctic Peninsula is unusually warm too appeared first on British Antarctic Survey.
[The Conversation Africa] Some periods in Earth history are so different from our own that they may as well belong to another planet. Many people are interested in the age of dinosaurs, or the Ice Ages, but it is an intermediate world, the Miocene Epoch - a sort of "in-between" world, geologically speaking: less recent than mammoths and stone tools, but not the deep past of dinosaurs - that many scientists find interesting.
Canada and Australia have agreed on terms to allow Ottawa to buy components of the Arctic over-the-horizon radar system from BAE Systems Australia.
A submarine named Ran was sent below the ice shelf in Antarctica and found some strange readings before disappearing entirely. Here's what it found.
Learn more about tourism in Antarctica and how we may be leaving more of a carbon footprint on this pristine place than we originally thought.
On June 20, 2020, the town of Verkhoyansk, Russia, reached a temperature of 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit, the highest temperature ever recorded in the Arctic Circle.
In recent years, marine heatwaves have been taking an ever-greater toll on the world’s oceans and their ecosystems. Amplified by increasing global warming, these events are occurring more frequently and lasting longer. The Arctic is not spared from this trend either, as it is warming faster than any other region on our planet. However, due to local processes and conditions, marine heatwaves in the Arctic differ fundamentally from those in non-polar oceans. A recent study, led by the Alfred Wegener Institute, in the journal Communications Earth & Environment, summarizes how these events have developed over recent decades, what science knows about the driving forces behind them, and where there are still knowledge gaps to be filled.
[allAfrica] Mombasa -- The world's oceans absorb a third of its carbon, feed billions, and are dying faster than most governments are moving to save them. Now, the ocean it depends on is the subject of urgent global negotiation, and for the first time, that conversation is happening in Africa.
Learn more about Antarctic sea squirts and how they could one day help with advanced melanoma treatments.
Sea ice is melting fast, worsening the climate crisis, but a bold attempt to rethicken it is showing early signs of success “This would have been a wild dream a year ago,” says Andrea Ceccolini, standing on Arctic sea ice just a 4-mile snowmobile ride from the Inuit town of Cambridge Bay, northern Canada. To his left are sky blue ponds of meltwater created in the last few days by a sun that no longer sets in the high north summer. To his right, the sea ice is still a brilliant white, the light dusting of snow on top continuing to sparkle. “It’s incredibly different, the boundary – I mean, you can point to it,” he says. The difference is the result of a bold geoengineering experiment being conducted by Ceccolini’s company, Real Ice, funded by the UK government. Continue reading...
Disappearing sea ice is letting more sunlight in the Arctic Ocean and boosting phytoplankton growth, but this has depleted a crucial nutrient, which could severely affect animals higher up the food chain
Antarctica was long thought to be seismically calm, but new technology makes it possible to detect unexpected types of earthquakes beneath the ice.
Cyprus tabled amendments to the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism at a meeting of EU finance ministers at the European Council.
Researchers are developing AI agents capable of calculating a product’s carbon footprint in real time, potentially helping consumers make more sustainable purchasing decisions.
Exclusive A vast area of the Bellingshausen Sea should be covered by sea ice by now, with one expert calling the loss of ice ‘depressing’ Antarctica’s west coast is missing an area of winter sea ice the size of France, sparking concerns for threatened penguins other marine life and global sea levels. One expert said the loss of ice in the Bellingshausen Sea was “depressing” and the failure of ice to form could have intensified a heatwave over the continent’s peninsular last week that saw daytime temperatures peak at 15.4C which is more than 20C above average. Continue reading...
Grande is the latest in a series of pop musicians including Sabrina Carpenter and SZA who have been angered by Trump administration videos Ariana Grande has rebuked Donald Trump’s White House over use of her music in a video documenting the detaining of immigrants. Earlier this week, the White House posted a montage of ICE agents handcuffing and detaining people, with the caption “Bye-bye President Trump has delivered the most secure border in history”. It was soundtracked by Grande’s 2024 song Bye. Continue reading...
Prehistoric squirrel droppings were analyzed and found to contain genetic material of numerous ice-age beasts, plants, microbes and fungi.
The global weather event long feared to arrive this year is now active in the Pacific, sparking fears of its impact on the climate across the US.
The number of icebergs in the Arctic has increased sharply since the 2000s. This is due to the destabilisation of large glaciers in north-east Greenland and parts of the Russian Arctic as well as the increasing mobility of sea ice. The result: Stones rain down from the melting icebergs, forming new hard-substrate habitats for marine life on the soft seafloor. This gradually alters the existing communities in the deep sea. At the same time, the increasing presence of icebergs also poses greater risks to shipping and fisheries. These findings were reported by a research team led by the Alfred Wegener Institute and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in the journal Nature.
Scientists have reconstructed genomes of woolly mammoths, horses, steppe bison and ground squirrels that roamed the grasslands of the Canadian Arctic as far back as 700,000 years ago using DNA found in frozen squirrel poop from the Yukon.
Ice splintered off the southern Patagonia glacier and drifted across a growing glacial lake.
Learn how likely new Arctic deep-sea species could help researchers map fragile sponge gardens and hydrothermal vents before mining plans return.
Azat Miftakhov's recent transfer to a notorious Arctic prison — and the alleged torture he has faced — have left supporters fearing for his life.
Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans, Volume 131, Issue 6, June 2026.
Two are dead after a snowmobile went through the ice Saturday, according to an RCMP release. A youth who survived walked 12 kilometres into town to report the incident.
July 11, 2026: Our weekly roundup of the latest science in the news, as well as a few fascinating articles to keep you entertained over the weekend
[This Day] The African Union (AU) and the African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) have begun preparing African diplomats for what could become one of the continent's biggest climate financing opportunities, training more than 80 ambassadors, senior diplomats and policy experts to negotiate a stronger African position in the rapidly expanding global carbon market.
This month, engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California are testing a spacecraft sensor that will help measure how quickly Arctic sea ice is disappearing. And while that instrument won’t launch for another year, scientists started preparing for its use during a recent field campaign in the Canadian wilderness. Researchers spent two weeks […]
China called on the United States and Iran to stick with peace plans after a resumption of missile strikes in the Middle East spurred a jump in oil prices. “Reigniting the conflict does not serve any party’s interests,” a spokesman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Wednesday. “We call on the US and Iran to follow through on their memorandum of understanding, resolve disputes through dialogue and negotiation, and avoid resorting to force.” Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, rose...
Charoen Pokphand (CP) Group has partnered with Mae Fah Luang Foundation on an inclusive carbon credit tokenisation initiative to turn forests into digital natural capital.
President Trump again urged the United States to control Greenland. He stated the Arctic island is vital for global security. Denmark's Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen rejected the demand, calling Greenland not for sale. Greenland's leadership also opposes any US acquisition of the territory. This ongoing dispute strains relations between the United States and Denmark.
Learn how Early Paleoindians may have survived on a diet made almost entirely of mammoths, giant ground sloths, and other Ice Age mammals.
A new study suggests that deep-sea life reaps the benefits of icebergs’ castoffs — a rare silver lining as a warming planet destabilizes glacial ice.
A new study presents a geological explanation for the East Antarctic Ice Sheet's head start.
New solutions to two interlinked mysteries reveal how and why the Antarctic’s enormous ice sheet formed.
Early Americans may have spread through the continents by targeting Ice Age giants, but not experts are convinced.
Researchers recently performed the first scientific test of sea ice thickening in the field, but there remains a big question mark over how scalable this method is.
This tower fan (aka "The Glacier") + a set of cooling bed sheets = the BEST sleep every night.View Entire Post ›
The snowfall from last winter disappeared a month sooner than usual, after two early hot spells. Huge volumes of exposed ice are now starting to vanish.
Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly discussed the possibility of the government reducing petroleum product prices in Egypt, following recent global price decreases due to regional stability and the decline in global oil prices. During his weekly press conference on Wednesday, Madbouly said that at the beginning of the 2025/ 2026 fiscal year, the price of oil … The post Will fuel prices decrease in Egypt following the global decline? appeared first on Egypt Independent.
[New Dawn] Monrovia -- Liberia is stepping up efforts to access global carbon finance through a strengthened partnership with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), as the government seeks to position the country to benefit from international carbon markets.
An eight-month expedition will set off soon from Norway on a mission to find new species before the climate crisis and pollution changes the northern ocean for ever Six scientists and six crew will travel next month to Kirkenes, a remote Arctic town in Norway near the Russian border, to begin an odyssey to one of the most inhospitable, inaccessible and least-studied regions on Earth. There, they will climb onboard a futuristic, floating laboratory – the French-built Tara polar station. They will enter a harsh and isolating environment: months of complete darkness and temperatures as low as -50C (-58F). Arriving in Norway on 14 August, they will await good conditions and an icebreaker to open a route for them before setting off on an eight-month voyage, overwintering through long, intense...
In 1999, the Alfred Wegener Institute launched an ambitious project: the HAUSGARTEN observatory in the Fram Strait between northeast Greenland and Svalbard. Spanning ice-covered waters and extending to depths of more than 5,500 metres, this unique research infrastructure has become a key site for monitoring the impact of climate change on polar marine ecosystems. A special issue of the journal Deep-Sea Research Part II: Topical Studies in Oceanography now brings together key findings from 25 years of research at HAUSGARTEN, underscoring the urgent need for global climate action.
Carbon monoxide detectors can emit various types of beeps. Some are relatively innocuous, while others are high-priority alerts that you should not ignore.
The United States of America is ... so many things, horrific and magnificent, good and evil, promising and cursed The United States of America is a truck that has driven into a ditch. The United States of America is a program that has been hacked. The United States of America is ... so many things, horrific and magnificent, good and evil, promising and cursed, as it approaches its quarter millennium mark. I say it as though the US was one thing, but it is a thousand things. It is the masked ICE agent shooting Renee Good while standing up for immigrants, but it is also Good herself and the immigrants, and the streets of Minneapolis and their Dakota and Ojibwe Indigenous past – and present and future. The US before 1865 was slaveowners, but it was also the enslaved and the abolitionists...
Dino fossils are a rare find in Antarctica due to unforgiving ice caps, though the frigid continent was once home to lush forests.
[Daily News] Dodoma -- THE government has dismissed claims that Tanzania has sold or surrendered its forests and natural resources to foreign countries through carbon trading agreements, insisting that the emerging market is being regulated to safeguard national interests while creating new economic opportunities.
Tel Aviv — On the evening of June 8, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party posted four words on its official X account. “There is no Gadi without Tibi.” Accompanying the short message was an AI-generated, 11-second clip showing two politicians – Gadi Eisenkot and Ahmad Tibi – standing together before a parliament covered in … The post Netanyahu’s emerging challenger represents his polar opposite, and that may be his appeal appeared first on Egypt Independent.
If Andy Burnham chooses the energy secretary, Labour could fully use the benefits of net zero to promote growth and jobs It should have been a great week for Ed Miliband and his mission to decarbonise the UK economy. Western Europe has experienced one of its worst ever heatwaves , providing powerful evidence of the need to transition away from fossil-fuel-driven energy production to reduce the carbon emissions that are contributing to global heating. Instead, however, he has been attacked by an unholy alliance of trade unions and leading City figures , apparently determined to prevent him becoming chancellor in the cabinet of the presumptive new prime minister, Andy Burnham. Josh Ryan-Collins is professor of economics and finance at the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose...
In Ladakh's arid Himalayan landscape, a revolutionary solution to water scarcity has emerged. Engineer Sonam Wangchuk pioneered the 'ice stupa,' an artificial glacier built in a conical shape. These towers store winter meltwater, releasing it gradually during the crucial spring planting season. This low-cost, energy-free innovation ensures vital irrigation for agriculture, transforming a challenging environment and offering hope to communities worldwide facing similar water crises.
Argentinian geologist Eduardo Olivero became the first scientist to find the remains of a dinosaur in Antarctica in 1986.
During a meeting of the three territorial premiers this week, the leaders signed an agreement re-committing to collaborate on issues of shared interest. They also discussed topics ranging from Arctic security and sovereignty to community wellness.
The two states and Canadian province aim to link their programs in 2027, even as carbon pricing faces new political pressure.
The approval of a carbon credit method for native forest management paves the way for the NSW government to fulfil its election promise to create the Great Koala National Park.
The post Carbon Captured appeared first on ProPublica.
Ottawa on Wednesday said it is launching the process to designate three new Arctic projects that are of national interest.
Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Volume 131, Issue 12, 28 June 2026.
Battling darkness and cold, researchers on a drifting laboratory will probe the biology of the Arctic Ocean
Drifting sea ice fragments near Alaska’s Saint Lawrence and Nunivak islands and colorful water around the Yukon Delta heralded the approach of the summer solstice.
Canada has taken the next step toward acquiring a highly sophisticated, long-range radar system to monitor the Arctic.
Unmanned drones have transformed into strategic weapons, capable of deep strikes and economic disruption. Ukraine's recent large-scale drone assaults on Russian oil refineries highlight this shift, undermining war economies and demonstrating vulnerability. Iran's long-range Shahed drones project power across the Middle East, challenging adversaries through sheer volume. India is also integrating indigenous kamikaze drones into its doctrine for precision strikes, underscoring the global evolution of drones as potent strategic assets.
Carbon monoxide in Uranus's deep atmosphere indicates that the planet contains more ice than rock, suggesting it formed more like Neptune than we thought
Open access notables Rapid rebound hides glacier mass loss from satellite observations in Alaska and Iceland , Sasgen et al., Communications Earth & Environment Time-variable satellite gravimetry constrains global glacier mass change, but requires correction for glacial isostatic adjustment. These corrections are commonly treated as slowly varying background signals from past ice loading and assumed to be separable from present-day glacier loss. Here we show that this separation can fail in low-viscosity settings, where viscoelastic rebound can approach isostatic compensation on annual-to-decadal timescales and covary with ongoing ice retreat. Using millennium-scale glacier reconstructions and viscoelastic Earth modelling, we incorporate rapid rebound into gravimetry...
Temperatures have climbed up to 45 degrees Fahrenheit above normal, stopping ice from forming in the dead of Antarctic winter.
An area of ice nearly the size of Texas has failed to form over the Bellingshausen Sea, off western Antarctica, as researchers investigate the links between sea ice loss and global warming.
In 2016, the Alfred Wegener Institute, together with the University of Bremen, the Palau Community College, and the Coral Reef Research Foundation, opened a research station at what is probably its warmest location: Palau. The archipelago lies in the heart of an area that is characterised by the cleanest air in the world. Moreover, this region is where the composition of the stratosphere - the layer of the atmosphere that contains the ozone layer - is determined for the whole planet. This makes the location ideal for studying the distribution of trace gases and particles in the atmosphere and their impact on the global climate, from Europe to the polar regions. Over the last ten years, the observatory has developed into one of the largest in the entire tropics and the largest in the Western...
As trade tensions between Beijing and Brussels continue to rise, China’s firms in the European Union have been forced to walk a delicate tightrope: expanding their presence in the lucrative market while grappling with heightened regulatory hurdles and rapid geopolitical shifts. In the first part of this three-part series, we look at a new, complex EU carbon tariff system that has business owners scratching their heads. Neil Miao has been exporting metal hardware to Europe for years. But earlier...
Amid fears the wreck will be more accessible to explorers – and new species – as the climate warms, conservationists want to create the region’s first underwater protected area The harsh temperatures, treacherous currents and shifting pack ice of the Antarctic’s Weddell Sea, which crushed and sank his ship, Endurance, in 1915, led Ernest Shackleton to describe it as the “worst portion of the worst sea in the world”. For more than a century, the inhospitable conditions, which present a challenge even for modern icebreaker ships, helped to protect the lost wreck, which was discovered in 2022 , its structure still largely intact. Continue reading...
[The Conversation Africa] Viruses play a major role in the functioning of ecosystems. They profoundly influence the dynamics of microbial communities, flow of matter and global biogeochemical cycles. Yet despite their abundance and ecological importance, many of them have long remained invisible to science.
Alaska's glaciers are melting faster as rising global temperatures extend melt seasons, with radar data showing heatwaves and ice loss reshaping climate science.
Climate scientists are sounding the alarm after a stubborn Antarctic heat wave shattered the region's winter heat record.
Researchers traced new undersea ecosystems of soft coral, sea anemones, sponges, and more to large rocks and mineral deposits ferried by icebergs from dry land to the Arctic floor.
The California Air Resources Board is under pressure to stabilize the nascent market for carbon capture after the loss of federal grants, but critics say the proposed rules could incentivize risky projects.
First ever global mapping of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi shows scale of hyphal systems that sustain plant life Our planet’s soils contain enough of the subterranean fungi that sustain plant life and help regulate the climate to stretch from the Earth to the sun almost three-quarters of a billion times, a groundbreaking new study has found. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi are networks of tubular cells called hyphae that sustain life on Earth by forming critical partnerships with more than 70% of plants. The networks, which have been forming for about 475 million years, provide nutrients and water in exchange for the carbon produced by the plants, and help to regulate the climate by drawing carbon into soils. Continue reading...
Temperatures above 15C ‘very strange’ say scientists, as snow melts and rain falls on glaciers in usually frozen region Temperatures in the Antarctic reached above 15C this month, shattering the previous winter heat record for the usually frozen region and raising concerns about the speed of climate breakdown. The new winter peak temperature was logged by the Argentinian Esperanza base on the Trinity peninsula on 6 June, amid a protracted heatwave, when the maximum daily temperature exceeded zero degrees for three consecutive weeks. Continue reading...
A team led by a geophysicist in Italy now believes that about 90% of Earth’s fresh water ice may not be on solid ground after all.
A mysterious geological structure that resembles a human hand with outstretched fingers has been revealed beneath East Antarctica. The discovery shows the frozen continent still hides many geological secrets.
Learn more about the treasure trove of evolutionary data uncovered from ancient Arctic ground squirrel droppings.
Daniel Crago says he feels ‘extremely lucky’ after encounter with bear at Glacier national park last month As the large roaring grizzly bear charged down at him from across a snow field in Montana and mauled him, hiker Daniel Crago had just enough time to put his arm up and think: “This is it.” But two weeks after that perilous, exceedingly rare encounter in Glacier national park, Crago, 32, is still alive, recovering after three surgeries and feeling “extremely lucky”, he said on Monday in an interview with ABC News . Continue reading...
PARIS (FRANCE) - Oceans are in a "deepening crisis" that demands urgent global action, a major UN report warned Monday, with seas warming and rising faster, ice cover shrinking and marine ecosystems under mounting strain.
Researchers say the Arctic Ocean crossed a biological tipping point in 2009, when nitrate levels in the water suddenly started dropping due to a drastic reduction in sea ice extent.
Hong Kong ranks among the world’s largest data centre hubs but has a carbon footprint exceeding the global average, a United Nations think tank study has found, urging a responsible strategy to tackle the “unintended impacts” of using artificial intelligence (AI). The June report by the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health also quantified not only carbon but water and land footprints of electricity arising from the use of AI. The report is a call for using AI...