articles

Researchers have discovered a sea’s worth of water locked within the sediment and rock of a lost volcanic plateau that’s now deep in the Earth’s crust.

The rapid spread of oil palm plantations and associated high use of fertilizer raises concerns about the emission of nitrous oxide (N2O), a powerful greenhouse gas. A new study by an international research team led by the University of Göttingen shows that oil palms’ photosynthesis and their response to meteorological and soil conditions play an important but still widely unexplored role in the amount of N2O produced by oil palm plantations.

In identifying and dating coral remains in drill cores taken from Belize reefs, a team of experts from Goethe University Frankfurt and partners from Germany, the USA and Canada has shown the importance of specific types of coral for reef-building during the current Holocene geological epoch, dating back some 12,000 years.

Winter is coming—eventually. And while the earth is warming, a new study suggests that the atmosphere is being pushed around in ways that cause long bouts of extreme winter cold or wet in some regions.

Volcanic ash is no ordinary dust: It gets injected into the atmosphere, climbs to the stratosphere, impacts climate, powders roadways and clogs jet engines.