Collaborate Disseminate
Time isn’t as constant as we might think. The Earth’s rotation is changing, which affects how many hours are in a day and how many days in a year. Now palaeontologists have managed to precisely measure how long days and years were back in the age of th… Continue reading Dinosaurs saw shorter days and longer years, says fossil shell study
Compasses point north – that’s a pretty constant fact of life. But it hasn’t always been the case, as the north and south poles actually flip on a semi-regularly basis. Exactly how long this process takes has been up for debate, and now a new study suggests it happens far more slowly than we previously thought.
..
Continue Reading Earth’s magnetic field reversals may take much longer than we thought
Category: Environment
Tags:
Continue reading Earth's magnetic field reversals may take much longer than we thought
When looking for other planets that could be hosting life, astronomers tend to focus on those that are very Earth-like. But doing so might be limiting our scope too much and underselling life’s hardiness. A new study has used simulations to s… Continue reading Snowball planets may still have habitable hotspots
Many of us will know what bubbling lakes of lava within volcanoes look like. After all, we’ve seen them our entire lives in movies, TV shows and cartoons. But that doesn’t mean they’re common. In fact, only seven lava lakes have been found so far, until now. After 30 years of suspecting the existence and location of the eighth, a team of scientists has finally confirmed it – within the crater of a remote, Subantarctic island volcano.
..
Continue Reading Earth’s eighth persistent lava lake found on remote sub-Antarctic island
Category: Science
Tags:
Continue reading Earth's eighth persistent lava lake found on remote sub-Antarctic island
Earth has had a tumultuous past, so it’s hard to get a clear idea of those wild early days. But a new study by researchers from the University of Adelaide raises the possibility that continents may have risen out of the sea much earlier than is currently believed, before being destroyed once again by tectonic activity.
..
Continue Reading Rock radioactivity may tell the tale of long-lost continents on early Earth’s crust
Category: Science
Tags:
Continue reading Rock radioactivity may tell the tale of long-lost continents on early Earth's crust
A multi-year field study of the deadly 2014 landslide that destroyed an entire community in Washington State is providing new insights into how such large-scale slides operate. A special team from the US Geological Survey did detailed measure… Continue reading Washington tragedy sheds light on landslide mechanics
A team of volcanologists at the University of Missouri turned fashion models recently as they showed off prototype lava suits that are designed as comfortable, hard-wearing field outfits for scientists bound for the slopes of Vesuvius and the… Continue reading Volcanologists model latest flame-resistant lava suit fashions
Alien life is almost certainly out there somewhere, but because it’s most likely microscopic, it probably won’t be easy to spot. Instead we might need to keep an eye out for other biomarkers, which could be detected in the atmosphere, soil or… Continue reading Looking for life on Mars? Look for pasta-shaped rocks
When Old Rose dropped the diamond necklace into the ocean at the end of Titanic, it turns out she was probably just returning it to where it originally came from. Researchers in Australia and Germany have found that many diamonds begin life a… Continue reading Diamonds found to be made mostly of the seafloor, pressure-cooked to perfection
A fossilized ecosystem offers new evidence for life that once existed in seemingly uninhabitable places. Continue reading 500-Million-Year-Old Worm ‘Superhighway’ Found Hidden in the Mountains