Latest science news in Earth & Climate
Scientists: Newly found fault caused Haiti quake
By RICK CALLAHAN 2010-08-13T21:32:26Z The devastating earthquake that rocked Haiti in January was unleashed by a previously undetected fault line - not the...
Scientists: Summer Catastrophes Fit Predictions
Asian Floods, Russian Wildfires, Arctic Ice Flow Mirrors 2007 U.N. Report on Climate Change
How Did the Friendly Skies Get So Unfriendly?
Large Carry-on and Checked Luggage Fees One of Many Reasons; Steven Slater Case Prompts Venting
Tricky Mantle: Intact Pocket of Ancient Earth May Have Escaped Mixing for 4.5 Billion Years
An analysis of isotopes in Arctic basalts indicates that the rocks may originate from a reservoir of ancient mantle that has avoided being recycled in the planet's active interior since...
Chinchilla poop reveals how much it rained
Chinchilla poop is serving an unlikely purpose in one of the world's driest places, Chile's Atacama Desert. The animals' tiny waste pellets are helping scientists reconstruct the rainfall in the...
Russia fires reach Chernobyl zone
Russia tackles wildfires it says have reached a region contaminated by Chernobyl nuclear fallout, amid concern they could spread radiation.
Dark-matter search plunges physicists to new depths
This month physicist Juan Collar and his associates are taking their attempt to unmask the secret identity of dark matter into a Canadian mine more than a mile underground...
Rain contributes to cycling patterns of clouds
Like shifting sand dunes, some clouds disappear in one place and reappear in another. New work this week in Nature shows why: Rain causes air to move vertically, which breaks...
Scientists give Greenland ice cap warning
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists say the entire ice mass of Greenland could disappear if temperatures rise by as little as 4 degrees F, with severe worldwide...
Fragile habitat of French mystery island 'risks being trampled underfoot'
Scientists say 'wonderful biological laboratory' of island that rose from stormy seas is under threat until official status guarantees protectionIn the early morning of 23 January 2009, the most powerful hurricane-force storm to...
Cool Ride: Carmakers Search for Greener Air Conditioning Refrigerant
Your car's air conditioner might be your best friend on a hot summer day, but it is certainly no friend of the environment thanks to the ozone-depleting refrigerant used to...
Huge iceberg to threaten ships, oil wells
NUUK, Greenland, Aug. 11 (UPI) -- An ice sheet four times bigger than Manhattan has split off from Greenland's coast and could threaten shipping lanes and oil platforms in...
Atari aims to revitalize aging brand, battered balance sheet
In the new West Los Angeles corporate offices of Atari Inc., the desks are mostly empty and the walls are mostly bare, but there's a red neon logo in the...
Speedy solution to Rubik's Cube
A 30-year quest to find the minimum number of moves needed to solve every configuration of a Rubik's Cube may have ended.
Facelift for FutureGen project
US flagship clean coal project morphs into repowering programme with $1 billion in economic stimulus funds
Opinion: Is current Indigenous hunting sustainable?
Indigenous hunting is unsustainable at the moment, George Wilson writes - but better wildlife management could improve the situation for the wildlife populations and the people who use them.
Deep ocean floor research yields promising results for microbiologists
Research by microbiologists is revealing how marine microbes live in a mysterious area of the Earth: the realm just beneath the deep ocean floor. The ocean crust may be the...
The Challenge of Traveling the Congo River
Melanie Stiassny, who studies the extraordinarily diverse fishes of the Congo River, begins her field trip up in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, where she will arrange for a boat...
Could Wildfires Threaten US Nuclear Reactors?
With nuclear energy facilities located near wildfires-prone areas in the US, could a similar situation happen here?
Polar bears, glaucous gulls most at risk from contaminants
Although animals throughout the Arctic are exposed to an alphabet soup of pollutants and contaminants that are carried north from industrialized countries, only polar bears in East Greenland and Svalbard...
Can Cell Phones Speed Adaptation to Climate Change?
FM radio and cellular phones are fostering a rising awareness of climate impacts and mitigation in some of the globe's remotest and most undeveloped regions. [More] ...
Chu Restores Top Energy Advisory Panel
U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu has announced the 12 members of his newly reconstituted...
No-Fishing Area Shrinks in Gulf
Since July 3, no oil has been observed in the area, federal officials say.
Chilean copper mine mishap weighs on markets
SANTIAGO, Chile, Aug. 10 (UPI) -- Chile's worst mining disaster since the February earthquake put lives of 33 miners at risk and raised concerns the copper prices might experience...
Nudibranchs, Corals and Readers' Questions
Terry Gosliner processes the nudibranch specimens collected in the Philippines, worries about bleached corals and answers readers questions.
Geologist Restores Historical Map of Northern New England
New Hampshire, Vermont and western Maine got a facelift recently when geology professor Wally Bothner undertook a painstaking restoration of a 12-by-16-foot wooden relief map created by state geologist Charles...
Namibia stresses Chinese space centre's earthly uses
As Chinese astronauts visit a space-tracking centre in Namibia a top science official predicts many spin-offs for the southern African country.
University balloon tracks dairies' acrid gases
An orange balloon floated 50 feet above California State University, Fresno's small dairy herd last week, helping in the unsavory task of gathering air samples from a plume of pungent...