Latest Physical geography Stories
Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online George Lowe, the last surviving member of Sir Edmund Hillary’s team that scaled Mount Everest in 1953, died on Wednesday at a nursing home in central England after a long-term battle with illness. Besides being one of the first men to reach the top of the world, Lowe also participated in the first crossing of Antarctica via the South Pole in 1957-58. He also made notable expeditions to Greenland and Ethiopia. Lowe and Hillary were...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online NASA has kickstarted another season of science flights over Greenland to perform research activity with Arctic ice sheets and sea ice. Operation IceBridge scientists will be flying a specially equipped P-3B research aircraft from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia to carry out land and sea ice surveys in and around Greenland and the Arctic Ocean through early May. NASA started the Operation IceBridge campaign in 2009 as a...
WASHINGTON, March 20, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- NASA's Operation IceBridge scientists have begun another season of research activity over Arctic ice sheets and sea ice with the first of a series of science flights from Greenland completed on Wednesday. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) A specially equipped P-3B research aircraft from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Va., is operating out of airfields in Thule and Kangerlussuaq,...
Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Recent climate induced changes to Arctic polar bears’ environment is affecting their habits and ability to survive, with the bears having to rely more and more on internal fat reserves, according to a new paper in the Journal of Animal Ecology. The bears are having particular difficulty adjusting to the shifting sea ice dynamics. In the past, sea ice has remained throughout the Arctic summer months, but now it is almost completely...
Peter Suciu for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online It was George Leigh Mallory who may have famously replied to the question “why do you want to climb Mount Everest” with the answer “because it’s there.” Whether he actually said those words or not is left to the ages, but what is certain is that Mallory and his climbing partner Andrew Irvine likely never made it to the summit of the world’s highest peak. Even if they did, which has been left to debate, the pair didn’t make...
Alan McStravick for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The oft-cliché idea behind the naming of Iceland and Greenland claims their names were derived in an attempt to fool would be sailing marauders, attracting them to the desolate but more hospitably named Greenland, leaving the citizens of Iceland to live upon their slightly more lush island without threat of invasion. In fact, Erik the Red, it is believed, gave the moniker to attract settlers to the ice covered island just to the...
BEREA, Ky., March 18, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A study published in the Journal of Rural Health reveals that people living in communities where mountaintop removal (MTR) mining occurs experience higher levels of illness compared to non-mining areas close by. Michael Hendryx, Chair of the Department of Health Policy, Management and Leadership in the School of Public Health, Director of West Virginia Rural Health Research Center of WVU, said, "Combined with all of the other...
LONDON, March 18, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Leading car hire comparator Carrentals.co.uk has announced it will be supporting the Ski 4 Cancer charity on its latest fundraising scheme in France. Ski 4 Cancer will be staging a charity challenge in La Tania on the 20th and 21st of March, in which entrants attempt to ski either the vertical height of Mont Blanc (4807 metres) or Everest (8848 metres) in just one day. The challenge will focus on the green, blue or red pistes,...
Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Previous studies have shown that warming oceans and ocean acidification threaten to destroy the ocean’s coral reefs. Now, a new study from Australian researchers published in the journal Global Change Biology suggests that yet another threat could decimate these delicate ecosystems. “Our research shows that when seawater is both acidic and warm – which is predicted to happen under future climate scenarios – coral reefs could be...
Around half of Cambodia's tropical flooded grasslands have been lost in just 10 years according to new research from the University of East Anglia. The seasonally flooded grasslands around the Tonle Sap, Southeast Asia’s largest freshwater lake, are of great importance for biodiversity and a refuge for 11 globally-threatened bird species. They are also a vital fishing, grazing, and traditional rice farming resource for around 1.1 million people. Research published today in the journal...
Latest Physical geography Reference Libraries
The dusky pademelon (Thylogale brunii), also known as the dusky wallaby, is a marsupial that can be found on the Kai and Aru islands, Papua New Guinea, and in the Trans Fly savanna and grasslands ecoregion in Papua Province in Indonesia. It prefers a habitat in both arid and tropical savannahs, forests, shrublands, lowlands, and grasslands. This species was named after its discoverer, Cornelis de Bruijn, and was once commonly known as philander, or “friend of man,” and the Aru Island...
Desert greening is made up of any number of methods used to revitalize deserts. So far, only arid and semi-arid desert are meant when using this expression. The icy deserts and other types are considered to be unsuitable. The different methods include landscaping methods to reduce evaporation, erosion, consolidation of topsoil, temperature, sandstorms and more, permaculture in general, planting trees, regeneration of salty, polluted, or degenerated soils, floodwater retention and...
Mammoth Cave National Park is located in the state of Kentucky in the United States. The park holds 52,830 acres of land that was once inhabited by Native Americans. Many mummies and artifacts have been found in Mammoth Cave and surrounding caves to support this. It is thought that first man of European descent to visit the area was John Houchin or Francis Houchin. The legend says that one of the brothers was hunting a wounded bear that entered the cave to hide. The first documented discovery...
Coral reefs are submerged structures consisting of calcium carbonate secreted by corals. Coral reefs are colonies of small animals found in marine waters that enclose few nutrients. The majority of coral reefs are constructed from stony corals, which then consist of polyps that come together in groups. The polyps are like small sea anemones, to which they are very closely related. Unlike the sea anemones, coral polyps secrete hard carbonate exoskeletons which provide support and protections...
Mudflats, or otherwise known as tidal flats, are coastal wetlands that form when mud is left behind by tides or rivers. They’re found in sheltered regions such as bayous, lagoons, estuaries, and bays. Mudflats might be seen geologically as exposed layers of bay mud, a result from the deposition of estuarine silts, marine animal detritus, and clays. The majority of the sediment in a mudflat is within the intertidal zone, therefore the flat is submerged and exposed about twice per day. In...
