News by Subject Earth Science

A new scientific study suggests snoek (Thyrsites atun) can recolonize the marine area of the Beagle Channel and South-Western Atlantic waters, an area in the American continent where this species competed with the hake (Merluccius sp.) to hunt preys in warmer periods. The conclusions open a new scene of potential changes that can affect trophic networks in this marine region due the effect of the rise of ocean temperatures.

Permafrost, is an element of the cryosphere which has not been as much studied as other soils like glaciers or marine ice. Now, for the first time, a review of the state of permafrost on Earth has been carried out thanks to the data analysis of more than 120 drillings distributed around the Arctic and the Antarctica, as well as in mountains and high plains worldwide.

The onset of the most recent ice age about 2.6 million years ago changed where the western Gulf of Mexico gets its supply of sediments. The finding adds new insight into how extreme climate change can directly impact fundamental geological processes and how those impacts play out across different environments.

Variations in the axial tilt of the Earth have significant implications for the rise and fall of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, the miles-deep blanket of ice that locks up huge volumes of water that, if melted, would dramatically elevate sea level and alter the world's coastlines. New research matches the geologic record of Antarctica's ice with the periodic astronomical motions of the Earth.

Heat trapped by greenhouse gases is raising ocean temperatures faster than previously thought, concludes an analysis of four recent ocean heating observations. The results provide further evidence that earlier claims of a slowdown or 'hiatus' in global warming over the past 15 years were unfounded.