News tagged with earth sciences

Explosive evolution need not follow mass extinctions, says study of ancient zooplankton

Following one of Earth's five greatest mass extinctions, tiny marine organisms called graptoloids did not begin to rapidly develop new physical traits until about 2 million years after competing species became ...

Biology / Evolution

created 5 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Infrared sounder on NASA's suomi NPP starts its mission

(PhysOrg.com) -- A powerful new infrared instrument, flying on NASA's newest polar-orbiting satellite, designed to give scientists more refined information about Earth's atmosphere and improve weather forecasts ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Feb 09, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Tree rings may underestimate climate response to volcanic eruptions: study

Some climate cooling caused by past volcanic eruptions may not be evident in tree-ring reconstructions of temperature change because large enough temperature drops lead to greatly shortened or even absent growing seasons, ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Feb 05, 2012 | popularity 3.7 / 5 (3) | comments 22 | with audio podcast

NASA's Juno spacecraft refines its path to Jupiter

(PhysOrg.com) -- NASA's solar-powered Juno spacecraft successfully refined its flight path Wednesday with the mission's first trajectory correction maneuver. The maneuver took place on Feb. 1. It is the first ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Feb 03, 2012 | popularity 3 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

SwRI-led RAD measures radiation from solar storm

The largest solar particle event since 2005 hit the Earth, Mars and the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft travelling in-between, allowing the onboard Radiation Assessment Detector to measure the radiation a human astronaut ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Jan 28, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Curiosity rover will serve as terramechanics instrument in explortation of Martian soils

NASA has announced that Raymond E. Arvidson, PhD, the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor in Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, has been ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Jan 20, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Berkeley Lab seeks to help US assert scientific leadership in critical materials

A few short decades ago, few could have imagined that the world would be seriously concerned over something called dysprosium. Also known as number 66 on the periodic table, dysprosium was once just another element for chemistry ...

Chemistry / Materials Science

created Jan 11, 2012 | popularity 3 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Could Siberian volcanism have caused the Earth's largest extinction event?

Around 250 million years ago, at the end of the Permian geologic period, there was a mass extinction so severe that it remains the most traumatic known species die-off in Earth's history. Although the cause ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jan 09, 2012 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (3) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft: Trajectory maneuver slated for Jan. 11

(PhysOrg.com) -- An engine firing on Jan. 11 will be the biggest maneuver that NASA's Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft will perform on its flight between Earth and Mars.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Jan 09, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (11) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

New data finds regions of North America have remained extremely stable for more than one billion years

Like lines in a deeply weathered face, the cracks and fissures in the Earth’s crust reveal a long and tumultuous lifetime. Massive continent-bearing plates have come together and broken apart, setting ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jan 06, 2012 | popularity 4 / 5 (3) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Air pollution levels from Deepwater Horizon spill similar to large urban area

(PhysOrg.com) -- The amount of air pollutants in the atmospheric plume generated by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill was similar to a large city according to a new NOAA-led study published today in a special ...

Space & Earth / Environment

created Dec 20, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

A small step for lungfish, a big step for the evolution of walking

The eel-like body and scrawny "limbs" of the African lungfish would appear to make it an unlikely innovator for locomotion. But its improbable walking behavior, newly described by University of Chicago scientists, ...

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Dec 12, 2011 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (16) | comments 11 | with audio podcast

Star Wars-inspired bacterium provides glimpse into life

(PhysOrg.com) -- A bacterium whose name was inspired by the Star Wars films has provided new clues into the evolution of our own cells and how they came to possess the vital energy-producing units called mitochondria.

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created Dec 09, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 10 | with audio podcast

Researchers assess radioactivity released to the ocean from the Fukushima nuclear facility

With news this week of additional radioactive leaks from Fukushima nuclear power plants, the impact on the ocean of releases of radioactivity from the plants remains unclear. But a new study by U.S. and Japanese researchers ...

Space & Earth / Environment

created Dec 06, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 1

Beam-line science to take us on a virtual journey to the center of the Earth

A new agreement between Macquarie University and the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO), will help us better understand everything from where earthquakes might occur to where gold ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Nov 22, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Earth science

Earth science (also known as geoscience, the geosciences or the Earth Sciences), is an all-embracing term for the sciences related to the planet Earth. It is arguably a special case in planetary science, the Earth being the only known life-bearing planet. There are both reductionist and holistic approaches to Earth science.

There are four major disciplines in earth sciences, namely geography, geology, geophysics and geodesy. These major disciplines use physics, chemistry, biology, chronology and mathematics to build a quantitative understanding of the principal areas or spheres of the Earth system.

For more information about Earth science, read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Related topics: climate change