Latest Pedology Stories

The thousands of oval lakes that dot Alaska's North Slope are some of the fastest-growing lakes on the planet. Ranging in size from puddles to more than 15 miles in length, the lakes have expanded at rates up to 15 feet per year, year in and year out for thousands of years. The lakes are shaped like elongated eggs with the skinny ends pointing northwest. How the lakes grow so fast, why they're oriented in the same direction and what gives them their odd shape has puzzled geologists for...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- Arctic lakes are shrinking, and melting permafrost brought on by higher temperatures may be the reason, according to a research paper. California, Alaska and New York researchers compared satellite images spanning 30 years of more than 10,000 large lakes over 200,000 square miles in Siberia. They concluded that lakes where permafrost remains frozen are growing. But where permafrost has thinned or completely melted, lakes are shrinking or disappearing, a change that could...

Fairbanks, Alaska - Continued arctic warming may be causing a decrease in the number and size of Arctic lakes. The issue is the subject of a paper published in the June 3 issue of the journal "Science." The paper, titled, "Disappearing Arctic Lakes" is the result of a comparison of satellite data taken of Siberia in the early 1970s to data from 1997-2004. Researchers, including Larry Hinzman with the Water and Environmental Research Center at the University of Alaska...