http://www.physorg.com/space-news/earth-sciences/ en-us PhysOrg.com provides the latest news on earth science, astronomy and space exploration. (PhysOrg.com) -- "Terra firma." It's Latin for "solid Earth." Most of the time, at least from our perspective here on the ground, Earth seems to be just that: solid. Yet the Earth beneath our feet is actually in constant motion. It moves through time and space, of course, along with the other objects in the universe, but it moves internally as well. http://www.physorg.com/news181194545.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 28 Dec 2009 03:50:49 EST news181194545 The sea was heaving, the skies gray. The captain of the research ship was worried about the weather. About 120 miles off the coast of Spain, three Rutgers University scientists had a narrow window of opportunity to find and retrieve their prize -- an 8-foot, torpedo-shaped yellow robot that they had launched seven months earlier off the coast of New Jersey. http://www.physorg.com/news181123469.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Sun, 27 Dec 2009 09:30:01 EST news181123469 (AP) -- Fewer earthquakes have been recorded in the Philippines' lava-spilling Mayon volcano, but magma continues to build up inside and any lull in activity could be followed by a bigger eruption, scientists said Saturday. http://www.physorg.com/news181026251.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Sat, 26 Dec 2009 05:04:43 EST news181026251 Glaciers along the Gulf of Alaska are enriching stream and near shore marine ecosystems from a surprising source - ancient carbon contained in glacial runoff, researchers from four universities and the U.S. Forest Service report in the December 24, 2009, issue of the journal Nature. http://www.physorg.com/news180786023.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:40:01 EST news180786023 The faint tug of the sun and moon on the San Andreas Fault stimulates tremors deep underground, suggesting that the rock 15 miles below is lubricated with highly pressurized water that allows the rock to slip with little effort, according to a new study by University of California, Berkeley, seismologists. http://www.physorg.com/news180785622.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 23 Dec 2009 13:30:01 EST news180785622 In finding answers to the mystery of the origin of life, scientists may not have to dig too deep. New research is shedding light on shallower waters as a possible location for where life on Earth began. http://www.physorg.com/news180726917.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 22 Dec 2009 18:40:01 EST news180726917 Monitoring the earthquakes caused from magma movements inside an active volcano could help to improve the accuracy of forecasting an eruption. http://www.physorg.com/news180725141.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 22 Dec 2009 18:00:03 EST news180725141 (PhysOrg.com) -- New research from scientists at The University of Manchester is set to improve predictions about climate and air quality - and make life easier for those suffering from respiratory problems. http://www.physorg.com/news180628222.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 21 Dec 2009 14:30:58 EST news180628222 (AP) -- Philippine troops on Monday pressed the last 3,000 villagers who have refused to heed government warnings to leave the danger zone around a volcano that experts say is ready to erupt. http://www.physorg.com/news180594352.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 21 Dec 2009 05:06:42 EST news180594352 Researchers studying a period of high carbon dioxide levels and warm climate several million years ago have concluded that slow changes such as melting ice sheets amplified the initial warming caused by greenhouse gases. http://www.physorg.com/news180530639.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Sun, 20 Dec 2009 13:00:06 EST news180530639 Oceanographers using the remotely operated vehicle (ROV) Jason discovered and recorded the first video and still images of a deep-sea volcano actively erupting molten lava on the seafloor. http://www.physorg.com/news180289662.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 17 Dec 2009 16:28:41 EST news180289662 (PhysOrg.com) -- A first-of-its-kind computer simulation that mirrors real-world observations of methane bubbling up from a seabed in the Arctic Ocean provides further evidence that warming oceans may unleash vast quantities of methane trapped in hydrate deposits buried beneath the seafloor. http://www.physorg.com/news180288229.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 17 Dec 2009 16:05:17 EST news180288229 Like an angry dog, a volcano growls before it bites, shaking the ground and getting "noisy" before erupting. This activity gives scientists an opportunity to study the tumult beneath a volcano and may help them improve the accuracy of eruption forecasts, according to Emily Brodsky, an associate professor of Earth and planetary sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz. http://www.physorg.com/news180210955.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:50:02 EST news180210955 Some geologic faults that appear strong and stable, slip and slide like weak faults. Now an international team of researchers has laboratory evidence showing why some faults that "should not" slip are weaker than previously thought. http://www.physorg.com/news180193925.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 16 Dec 2009 14:40:01 EST news180193925 A new analysis of the geological record of the Earth's sea level, carried out by scientists at Princeton and Harvard universities and published in the Dec. 16 issue of Nature, employs a novel statistical approach that reveals the planet's polar ice sheets are vulnerable to large-scale melting even under moderate global warming scenarios. Such melting would lead to a large and relatively rapid rise in global sea level. http://www.physorg.com/news180192652.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 16 Dec 2009 14:00:01 EST news180192652 New climate research reveals how wind shear -- the same atmospheric conditions that cause bumpy airplane rides -- affects how pollution contributes to isolated thunderstorm clouds. Under strong wind shear conditions, pollution hampers thunderhead formation. But with weak wind shear, pollution does the opposite and makes storms stronger. http://www.physorg.com/news180111002.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:51:08 EST news180111002 (PhysOrg.com) -- For most of a decade, scientists have documented unfelt and slow-moving seismic events, called episodic tremor and slip, showing up in regular cycles under the Olympic Peninsula of Washington state and Vancouver Island in British Columbia. They last three weeks on average and release as much energy as a magnitude 6.5 earthquake. http://www.physorg.com/news180103695.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:48:55 EST news180103695 The analysis of microfossils found in ocean sediment cores is illuminating the environmental conditions that prevailed at high latitudes during a critical period of Earth history. http://www.physorg.com/news180096839.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:30:01 EST news180096839 A new study of Pacific Ocean sediments off the coast of Chile has found that offshore waters experienced systematic oxygen depletion during the rapid warming of the Antarctic following the last "glacial maximum" period 20,000 years ago. http://www.physorg.com/news180096546.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 10:49:40 EST news180096546 (PhysOrg.com) -- In the minutes after a strong earthquake struck offshore of the Indonesian city of Padang on Sept. 30, fears of a tsunami prompted hundreds of thousands of residents to evacuate the coastal city. Or try to. http://www.physorg.com/news180022388.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 14 Dec 2009 15:00:01 EST news180022388 (PhysOrg.com) -- The most detailed seismic images yet published of the plumbing that feeds the Yellowstone supervolcano shows a plume of hot and molten rock rising at an angle from the northwest at a depth of at least 410 miles, contradicting claims that there is no deep plume, only shallow hot rock moving like slowly boiling soup. http://www.physorg.com/news179994313.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 14 Dec 2009 07:10:32 EST news179994313 An island-sized iceberg is breaking up as it drifts closer to Australia, producing hundreds of smaller slabs spread over a massive area of ocean, experts said Monday. http://www.physorg.com/news179994041.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 14 Dec 2009 06:21:28 EST news179994041 (PhysOrg.com) -- If you've ever been to Hawaii, you probably spent your time enjoying the scenery of the beautiful islands, rather than wondering how they got to be there in the first place. But that's just what scientists have been trying to figure out for nearly 40 years, since a theory about their formation was first proposed that suggests volcanic hotspots like Hawaii are the result of plumes of hot rock, which rise from deep down in the Earth's mantle. http://www.physorg.com/news179765116.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Fri, 11 Dec 2009 14:46:11 EST news179765116 (AP) -- On a mountaintop clearing in the Sierra Nevada stands a tall metal platform holding a crude furnace and a box of silver iodide solution that some scientists believe could help offer relief from searing droughts. http://www.physorg.com/news179691518.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 10 Dec 2009 18:19:33 EST news179691518 It's no secret that the emissions leaving a car tailpipe or factory smokestack affect climate and air quality. Even trees release chemicals that influence the atmosphere. But until now, scientists have struggled to know where these organic molecules go and what happens to them once they leave their source, leading to models for predicting climate and air quality that are incomplete or less than accurate. http://www.physorg.com/news179677214.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 10 Dec 2009 14:50:04 EST news179677214 (PhysOrg.com) -- The gases which formed the Earth's atmosphere - and probably its oceans - did not come from inside the Earth but from outer space, according to a study by University of Manchester and University of Houston scientists. http://www.physorg.com/news179676765.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 10 Dec 2009 14:13:36 EST news179676765 Environmental scientists at the University of Pennsylvania and Durham University have employed a novel combination of geological and model reconstructions of wetland environments during a 10,000-year period to address spatial variations in sea-level history and provide quantitative estimates of subsidence along the east coast of England. http://www.physorg.com/news179664698.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 10 Dec 2009 10:52:28 EST news179664698 (PhysOrg.com) -- The oceans play a key role in regulating climate, absorbing more than a quarter of the carbon dioxide that humans put into the air. Now, the first year-by-year accounting of this mechanism during the industrial era suggests the oceans are struggling to keep up with rising emissions -a finding with potentially wide implications for future climate. http://www.physorg.com/news179602661.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 09 Dec 2009 18:10:07 EST news179602661 The Mediterranean Sea was mostly filled in less than two years in a dramatic flood around 5.33 million years ago in which water poured in from the Atlantic, according to a study published Wednesday. http://www.physorg.com/news179598629.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:00:02 EST news179598629 Spain on Wednesday handed back to the United States a robot which last week completed the first underwater crossing of the Atlantic Ocean to help monitor climate change by tracking temperatures. http://www.physorg.com/news179588220.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 09 Dec 2009 14:30:06 EST news179588220