EurekAlert! News by Subject: Atmospheric Science - News by Subject: Atmospheric Science

Atmospheric Science

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 6-Nov-2025 17:11 ET (6-Nov-2025 22:11 GMT/UTC)

6-Nov-2025

Long-lived contrails usually form in natural ice clouds

Johannes Gutenberg Universitaet Mainz
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Long-lived contrails form predominantly not in cloud-free skies, but within already existing ice clouds. This is the conclusion reached by a team of scientists from Forschungszentrum Jülich, the University of Cologne, the University of Wuppertal, and Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz.

Journal: Nature Communications

6-Nov-2025

Understanding clouds to improve the accuracy of climate predictions

Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization
Grant and Award Announcement

A new ERC synergy grant provides funding to investigate the role of turbulence in the physics of stratocumulus clouds and create meteorological models to improve weather and climate predictions

The interdisciplinary team consists of Eberhard Bodenschatz (Göttingen, Germany), Fabian Hoffmann (Berlin, Germany), Bernhard Mehlig (Gothenburg, Sweden) and Pier Siebesma (Delft, Netherlands), and their research groups

The team was awarded 13,7 million euros for six years

Funder: European Research Council

5-Nov-2025

Experts warn of wider health impact of tropical cyclones in a warming climate

BMJ Group
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Beyond direct injuries, exposure to tropical cyclones is associated with higher risks of death across a range of causes including kidney, heart and lung diseases, neuropsychiatric conditions, and diabetes, finds a study published in The BMJ’s climate issue today.

Journal: The BMJ
Funder: Australian Research Council, Australian National Health and Medical Research Council

5-Nov-2025

ITU at COP30: Driving Green Digital Action for a sustainable future

International Telecommunication Union
Meeting Announcement

UN agency for digital technologies urges collective action in Belém to harness digital technologies and achieve sustainability goals

5-Nov-2025

The chilling effect of air pollution

University of Washington
Peer-Reviewed Publication

New University of Washington-led research attributes accelerated warming to reduced cloud reflectivity. As efforts to improve air quality have reduced pollution, clouds became less mirror-like, letting more solar radiation reach Earth and revealing the true impact of greenhouse gases.

Journal: Nature Communications

4-Nov-2025

Lightning-prediction tool could help protect the planes of the future

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A new model predicts how lightning would sweep across any airplane, including those with experimental designs. The tool generates a zoning map of the plane, showing which sections require more or less lightning protection.

Journal: IEEE Access
Funder: Boeing Company

4-Nov-2025

Jülich researchers reveal: Long-lived contrails usually form in natural ice clouds

Forschungszentrum Juelich
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Contrails in the blue sky remind us of daily air traffic – and its impact on the climate. However, the effect of contrails on the climate is still only partially understood. It is assumed that they have a predominantly warming effect. Researchers from Forschungszentrum Jülich and universities in Mainz, Cologne, and Wuppertal have now discovered: 80 per cent of all long-lived contrails do not form in cloudless skies, but within existing natural ice clouds, known as cirrus clouds. The climate impact of these embedded contrails has hardly been investigated to date. However, the study published in the journal Nature Communications provides new insights and could influence the planning of climate-optimized flight routes in the future.

Journal: Nature Communications