http://www.physorg.com/space-news/earth-sciences/ en-us PhysOrg.com provides the latest news on earth science, astronomy and space exploration. From a devastating food crisis in Guatemala to water cuts in Venezuela, El Nino has compounded drought damage across Latin America this year. http://www.physorg.com/news177921078.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Fri, 20 Nov 2009 06:50:11 EST news177921078 Arnie Miller, University of Cincinnati professor of paleontology in the McMicken College of Arts & Sciences, and co-author Michael Foote of the University of Chicago publish their research in the Nov. 20 issue of Science with their paper, "Epicontinental Seas Versus Open-Ocean Settings: The Kinetics of Mass Extinction and Origination." http://www.physorg.com/news177873594.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:23:28 EST news177873594 (PhysOrg.com) -- Much of our planet's mineral wealth was deposited billions of years ago when Earth's chemical cycles were different from today's. Using geochemical clues from rocks nearly 3 billion years old, a group of scientists including Andrey Bekker and Doug Rumble from the Carnegie Institution have made the surprising discovery that the creation of economically important nickel ore deposits was linked to sulfur in the ancient oxygen-poor atmosphere. http://www.physorg.com/news177863954.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:30:01 EST news177863954 (PhysOrg.com) -- Roughly 15,000 years ago, at the end of the last ice age, North America's vast assemblage of large animals -- including such iconic creatures as mammoths, mastodons, camels, horses, ground sloths and giant beavers -- began their precipitous slide to extinction. http://www.physorg.com/news177864298.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:45:49 EST news177864298 (PhysOrg.com) -- A new study of Antarctica's past climate reveals that temperatures during the warm periods between ice ages (interglacials) may have been higher than previously thought. The latest analysis of ice core records suggests that Antarctic temperatures may have been up to 6°C warmer than the present day. http://www.physorg.com/news177773495.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:32:16 EST news177773495 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. The study appears in this week's issue of the journal Nature. http://www.physorg.com/news177772960.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:23:43 EST news177772960 PIC=32536:left]Increasing temperatures at high altitudes are fueling the post-1950 growth spurt seen in bristlecone pines, the world's oldest trees, according to new research. http://www.physorg.com/news177608541.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:30:01 EST news177608541 A dangerous level of carbon dioxide and methane gas haunts Lake Kivu, the freshwater lake system bordering Rwanda and the Republic of Congo. http://www.physorg.com/news177606996.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:50:02 EST news177606996 Rising water temperatures are kicking up more powerful winds on Lake Superior, with consequences for currents, biological cycles, pollution and more on the world's largest lake and its smaller brethren. http://www.physorg.com/news177515344.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Sun, 15 Nov 2009 13:53:30 EST news177515344 A state-of-the-art underwater robot called BOB may hold the key to protecting millions of people around Turkey's biggest city against a massive earthquake scientists say is all but inevitable. http://www.physorg.com/news177394319.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Sat, 14 Nov 2009 04:40:01 EST news177394319 (PhysOrg.com) -- The latest image from the U.S./French Jason-2 satellite finds a strong wave of warm water heading toward the Americas, fueling El Nino. http://www.physorg.com/news177322493.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Fri, 13 Nov 2009 08:15:31 EST news177322493 Russia, the world's largest country, has grown even larger recently thanks to an earthquake and a volcanic eruption in its seismically active far eastern regions, a scientist said on Friday. http://www.physorg.com/news177311648.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Fri, 13 Nov 2009 05:14:50 EST news177311648 Satellite observations and a state-of-the art regional atmospheric model have independently confirmed that the Greenland ice sheet is loosing mass at an accelerating rate, reports a new study in Science. http://www.physorg.com/news177258173.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:23:32 EST news177258173 Spurred by a warming climate, daily record high temperatures occurred twice as often as record lows over the last decade across the continental United States, new research shows. The ratio of record highs to lows is likely to increase dramatically in coming decades if emissions of greenhouse gases continue to climb. http://www.physorg.com/news177254019.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 12 Nov 2009 13:14:32 EST news177254019 Long-term variations in volcanism help explain the birth, evolution and death of striking geological features called oceanic core complexes on the ocean floor, says geologist Dr Bram Murton of the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton. http://www.physorg.com/news177243136.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 12 Nov 2009 10:30:02 EST news177243136 The Earth's climate was far cooler -- perhaps more than 50 degrees -- billions of years ago, which could mean conditions for life all over the planet were more conducive than previously believed, according to a research team that includes a Texas A&M University expert who specializes in geobiology. http://www.physorg.com/news177171329.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:00:02 EST news177171329 (PhysOrg.com) -- The scalding-hot sea that supposedly covered the early Earth may in fact never have existed, according to a new study by Stanford University researchers who analyzed isotope ratios in 3.4 billion-year-old ocean floor rocks. Their findings suggest that the early ocean was much more temperate and that, as a result, life likely diversified and spread across the globe much sooner in Earth's history than has been generally theorized. http://www.physorg.com/news177168552.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:00:01 EST news177168552 (PhysOrg.com) -- A University of Arkansas professor and his colleagues have shown that the Earth's mantle contains the same isotopic signatures from magnesium as meteorites do, suggesting that the planet formed from meteoritic material. This resolves a long-standing debate in the field over the planet's origins. http://www.physorg.com/news177097140.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:39:32 EST news177097140 As sea-surface temperatures rise across the globe, some scientists believe that hurricane frequency and intensity may increase. A fresh technique offers promise to generate new data from long-dead storms, which could improve researchers' forecasts and make them more accurate. http://www.physorg.com/news177095065.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:07:52 EST news177095065 California experienced centuries-long droughts in the past 20,000 years that coincided with the thawing of ice caps in the Arctic, according to a new study by UC Davis doctoral student Jessica Oster and geology professor Isabel Montaņez. http://www.physorg.com/news177088772.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 10 Nov 2009 15:20:55 EST news177088772 Large blooms of tiny marine plants called phytoplankton are flourishing in areas of open water left exposed by the recent and rapid melting of ice shelves and glaciers around the Antarctic Peninsula. This remarkable colonisation is having a beneficial impact on climate change. As the blooms die back phytoplankton sinks to the sea-bed where it can store carbon for thousands or millions of years. http://www.physorg.com/news176986161.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 09 Nov 2009 10:49:50 EST news176986161 With an average of four mini-earthquakes per day, Southern California's San Jacinto fault constantly adjusts to make it a less likely candidate for a major earthquake than its quiet neighbor to the east, the Southern San Andreas fault, according to an article in the journal Nature Geoscience. http://www.physorg.com/news176908962.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:23:32 EST news176908962 The impact of airborne nitrogen released from the burning of fossil fuels and wide-spread use of fertilizers in agriculture is much greater that previously recognized and even extends to remote alpine lakes, according to a study published Nov. 6 in the journal Science. http://www.physorg.com/news176655560.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:00:01 EST news176655560 (PhysOrg.com) -- When small earthquakes shake the central U.S., citizens often fear the rumbles are signs a big earthquake is coming. Fortunately, new research instead shows that most of these earthquakes are aftershocks of big earthquakes (magnitude 7) in the New Madrid seismic zone that struck the Midwest almost 200 years ago. http://www.physorg.com/news176564939.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 04 Nov 2009 13:49:32 EST news176564939 A Peruvian scientist has called on his country to help slow the melting of Andean glaciers by daubing white paint on the rock and earth left behind by receding ice so they will absorb less heat. http://www.physorg.com/news176526912.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Wed, 04 Nov 2009 03:15:32 EST news176526912 Volcanic activity may split the African continent in two owing to a recent geological crack in northeastern Ethiopia, researchers said on Tuesday. http://www.physorg.com/news176486243.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Tue, 03 Nov 2009 16:30:01 EST news176486243 The remaining ice fields atop famed Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania could be gone within two decades and perhaps even sooner, based on the latest survey of the ice fields remaining on the mountain . http://www.physorg.com/news176399304.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:40:01 EST news176399304 Deep-sea ecosystems occupying 60% of the Earth's surface could be vulnerable to the effects of global warming warn scientists writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. http://www.physorg.com/news176398686.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 02 Nov 2009 15:38:48 EST news176398686 (PhysOrg.com) -- In 2005, a gigantic, 35-mile-long rift broke open the desert ground in Ethiopia. At the time, some geologists believed the rift was the beginning of a new ocean as two parts of the African continent pulled apart, but the claim was controversial. http://www.physorg.com/news176395329.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:43:38 EST news176395329 Scientists including researchers from the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton and the University of Essex have discovered that interactions between iron supply, transported through the atmosphere from deserts, and large-scale oceanic circulation control the availability of a crucial nutrient, nitrogen, in the Atlantic. Their findings have potentially important implications for understanding global climate, both past and future. http://www.physorg.com/news176387275.html Space & Earth - Earth Sciences Mon, 02 Nov 2009 12:28:36 EST news176387275