The term Digital Twin of the Earth creates the idea of the availability of a highly accurate virtual copy of our planet, enabling researchers to predict the most complex future climate developments and extreme natural events. In fact, such a replica – or model representation of the Earth systems – is the goal of the Destination Earth project, funded by the European Union. In an article published in Socio-Environmental Systems Modelling, Professor Robert Reinecke of Mainz University and his co-authors point out the lack of a clear definition of the term "Digital Twin of the Earth", which may be misleading. "All digital representations of our planet are model representations. As such, they will always be detached from reality – as a map can never fully replicate the land it depicts," said Reinecke.

A major new scientific report charts an urgent course correction for how the world grows food and uses land in order to avoid irretrievably compromising Earth’s capacity to support human and environmental wellbeing.   

Produced at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) under the leadership of Prof. Dr. Johan Rockström in collaboration with the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), the report is launched as nearly 200 UNCCD member states begin the COP 16 summit (2-13 Dec) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

An international research collaboration has shed new light on the molecular basis of gene expression, the fundamental biological process that underpins how all organisms use their genetic information. 

 

The team used an advanced microscopy technique to capture in unprecedented detail a critical moment as genetic information is translated into the proteins that form nature’s structures and biochemical processes. 

More than a million years ago, on a hot savannah teeming with wildlife near the shore of what would someday become Lake Turkana in Kenya, two completely different species of hominins may have passed each other as they scavenged for food.

Scientists know this because they have examined 1.5-million-year-old fossils they unearthed and have concluded they represent the first example of two sets of hominin footprints made about the same time on an ancient lake shore. The discovery will provide more insight into human evolution and how species cooperated and competed with one another, the scientists said.

A groundbreaking study in the field of forensic seismology, conducted by Tel Aviv University researchers, has identified the seismic signature of Hamas forces' movement before the October 7th attack. Researchers from the Department of Geophysics at Tel Aviv University's Porter School of the Environment and Earth Sciences and Sackler Faculty of Exact Sciences recently analyzed data recorded at three seismic stations in southern Israel.

Researchers have quantified for the first time the global emissions of a sulfur gas produced by marine life, revealing it cools the climate more than previously thought, especially over the Southern Ocean.

The study, published in the journal Science Advances, shows that the oceans not only capture and redistribute the sun's heat, but produce gases that make particles with immediate climatic effects, for example through the brightening of clouds that reflect this heat.