The Southern Ocean is one of Earth's most important climate regulators, yet the clouds covering this remote region remain among the least understood features in atmospheric science. Their influence on the planet's energy balance makes accurate cloud representation essential for reliable weather forecasts and climate projections. A new study combines observations from an Antarctic expedition with advanced atmospheric datasets and climate models to investigate the processes behind this long-standing challenge in climate science.

Weather forecasts rely on many and various kinds of data, including temperature, humidity and wind data. For the first time, researchers including those at the University of Tokyo demonstrate that a long-theorized improvement to weather models by adding data on water isotopes in the atmosphere does in fact work. They showed that incorporating satellite measurements of water vapor isotopes into weather models improves forecasts of atmospheric conditions for up to five days, including better predictions of heavy rainfall in many regions.  

For decades, scientists have studied iron preserved in ancient rocks to reconstruct how Earth’s oceans and atmosphere became rich in oxygen. A new study suggests iron has recorded other major transformations too. Michigan State University research Dalton Hardisty and colleagues found that changes in Earth’s iron record also reflect the building of mountains and the rise of land plants.

New research led by the University of Colorado Denver finds that Denver-area bus riders change their commuting patterns when faced with cold or rain, but not as much for wildfire smoke or ozone warnings. But weather alone doesn't tell the whole story. Whether riders had to pay a fare, what time of day they traveled, and whether or not the bus stop is protected against the elements also play a role. 

In a paper published in SCIENCE CHINA Earth Sciences, researchers quantified the cumulative heatwave exposure of different birth cohorts and regions in China over their lifetimes. The study reveals that younger generations face substantially higher lifetime heatwave exposure, while regions with lower economic development experience a mismatch between increasing climate hazards and limited adaptive capacity. These findings help reveal how lifetime heatwave exposure is distributed across generations and regions and provide a basis for designing targeted adaptation strategies.

Coastal residents may be worried about exposure to forever chemicals from sea spray during hot summer months, but York University researchers found there was little evidence of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination from marine aerosols, a finding that surprised them. The study looked specifically at areas impacted by sea spray from the Atlantic Ocean generated by waves breaking on the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, however, despite its windy, marine location they found it was not an issue as previously thought.

In a paper published in SCIENCE CHINA Earth Sciences, researchers at Sun Yat-sen University developed an SFA-based Climate Prediction (SCP) method, which directly extracted slow-varying predictable signals from observed precipitation data and applied it to seasonal prediction of summer precipitation over South China. Independent forecasts for 2011–2022 show that the SCP method achieves a regional mean temporal correlation coefficient of 0.36 and accurately predicted the sign of regional-mean precipitation anomalies in 10 of 12 summers, outperforming two dynamical models and a hybrid dynamical–statistical prediction system. The study provides a new perspective to identifying potentially predictable signals and improving regional seasonal precipitation prediction.