Latest Earth sciences Stories

NASA says it has produced a unique movie about Earth's changing ice and snow cover to be shown at U.S. science centers and museums. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration says the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., produced the film for its Science on a Sphere projection system -- a fully spherical video technology. The six-foot spheres are installed in more than 30 locations around the world. The space agency said Frozen uses satellite data to investigate all parts...

NASA has created a unique "spherical" movie about Earth's changing ice and snow cover as captured by NASA spacecraft. "Frozen," a 12-minute, narrated film, premieres at science centers and museums March 27.NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., produced the film for the "Science on a Sphere" projection system, a fully spherical video technology developed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The six-foot spheres are installed in...

Glacier ice appears to be melting in the western portion of Antarctica and not only on the Antarctic Peninsula, scientists reported on Wednesday in conclusion to the 2007-2008 International Polar Year.The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) alongside the International Council for Science (ICSU) released the "State of Polar Research" report today. The IPY took into account the work of more than 160 projects from researchers in more than 60 countries and received funding of about $1.2...

More than 200 scientists from around the world have attended the weeklong POLinSAR 2009 workshop hosted at ESRIN, ESA's Earth Observation centre in Frascati, Italy. Discussions among the participants include new techniques for providing vital information on our planet that could help to combat global warming through carbon accounting, wetland preservation and improve climate models.Using the novel polarimetric mode of the PALSAR synthetic aperture radar (SAR) aboard Japan's ALOS satellite, Dr...

Recently-reported NASA satellite data shows that Greenland, Antarctica and Alaska have shed more than 2 trillion tons of land ice since 2003. Scientists said the data collected by NASA's GRACE satellite show signs of global climate change. NASA geophysicist Scott Luthcke said more than half of the loss of landlocked ice in the past five years has occurred in Greenland, based on measurements of ice weight. That's enough melted water to fill up about 11 Chesapeake Bays, he said, and the...

Wildlife satellite studies could lead to a radical re-thinking about how the snowy owl fits into the Northern ecosystem."Six of the adult females that we followed in a satellite study spent most of last winter far out on the Arctic sea ice," said Université Laval doctoral student Jean-Francois Therrien, who is working with Professor Gilles Gauthier as part of an International Polar Year (IPY) research project to better understand key indicator species of Canadian northern...

EPFL researchers have developed a numerical model that can re-create the state of Switzerland's Rhône Glacier as it was in 1874 and predict its evolution until the year 2100. This is the longest period of time ever modeled in the life of a glacier, involving complex data analysis and mathematical techniques. The work will serve as a benchmark study for those interested in the state of glaciers and their relation to climate change.The Laboratory of Hydraulics, Hydrology and Glaciology at...

Frozen arctic soil contains nearly twice the greenhouse-gas-producing organic material as was previously estimated, according to recently published research by University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists.School of Natural Resources & Agricultural Sciences professor Chien-Lu Ping published his latest findings on the Nature Geoscience and Scientific American Web sites. Wielding jackhammers, Ping and a team of scientists dug down more than one meter into the permafrost to take soil samples...

Scientists of the Soil Science and Geopharmacy Research Group of the University of Granada (Spain), directed by Rafael Delgado, have discovered and characterized a new type of atmospheric aerosols named 'iberulites', which could be useful for the study of relevant atmospheric reactions from Earth.Researchers José Luis Díaz Hernández, of the Andalusian Research and Farming, Fishing, Food, and Ecological Production Training Institute (IFAPA) and Jesús Párraga Martínez, of the...

Observations on ice coverage and thickness show that sea ice in the Arctic may be headed for a consecutive record low in a trend that demands action from governments pursuing a new climate pact, the Worldwide Fund for Nation said on Monday."If you take reduced ice thickness into account, there is probably less ice overall in the Arctic this year than in any other year since monitoring began," said Martin Sommerkorn, senior climate adviser of the WWF's Arctic program."This is...