When most people think of Antarctica, meteorites aren’t the first things that come to mind. Perhaps they imagine the huge ice shelves, the desolate interior, or perhaps penguin colonies near one of the scientific bases — but usually not meteorites. So why is our project looking for meteorites in Antarctica, and besides, aren’t they all lost until they are found? Let’s start with the A ...[Read More]
Each month, Jesse Zondervan picks his favourite posts from geoscience and development blogs/news which cover the geology for global development interest. Here’s a round-up of Jesse’s selections for the last month: This month Cyclone Fani hit India with full force. An effective mass evacuation resulting in the loss of no human lives is an impressive disaster management feat. As disaster was averted ...[Read More]
What does it take to build a habitat in ice on the Moon? An international group of university students and professionals is working together to provide this answer and develop a sustainable and operational habitat in lunar ice. The project is called IGLUNA and is organised by the Swiss Space Center and the European Space Agency (ESA) as the first initiative from ESA_Lab, an ESA interuniversity res ...[Read More]
It is a question that humankind has been asking for thousands of years: Are we alone in the Universe or are there other worlds like our own? As of today, it is unknown whether or not inhabited planets exist outside of our own solar system. With the discovery of the extrasolar planet 51 Peg b in 1992, it was confirmed that our sun is not the only star that hosts planets and therefore the search for ...[Read More]
The 2019 EGU General Assembly was a great success. Not only was it the largest in EGU history (with over 16,000 participants, 5,531 oral, 9,432 poster and 1,287 PICO presentations) but it also allowed scientists to connect geoscience and their research with global challenges and potential solutions. One of the highlights of this year’s General Assembly was the high-level session on Science, Politi ...[Read More]
Dust devils are like miniature tornadoes, they form when a pocket of hot air near the surface moves fast upward and meets cooler air above it. As the air rapidly rises, the column of hot air is stretched vertically, thereby moving mass closer to the axis of rotation, which causes intensification of the spinning effect by conservation of angular momentum. In the Atacama Desert [in Chile] they are r ...[Read More]
How peaceful it is to contemplate the sky … This is especially true of polar northern or southern skies where the low temperatures can engender unique light phenomena. We often tend call them all, wrongly, sundogs, but in fact, many more phenomena exist. To list a few, you can observe a parhelic circle, a 22° halo, a pair of sun dogs, a lower tangent arc, a 46° halo, a circumzenithal arc, a parry ...[Read More]
Disclaimer: This article contains minor spoilers for Season 8 of “Game of Thrones.” A basic understanding of the world of Game of Thrones is assumed in this post. The Game of Thrones world of ice and fire is an unpredictable place both politically and environmentally. While the fate of the Iron Throne is yet to be confirmed, a humble steward has been working diligently to make some sense of the pl ...[Read More]
Post by Anne Van Loon, Gemma Coxon, and Bentje Brauns. Last year, Anne Van Loon wrote about data sharing initiatives in hydrology (“Data drought or data flood?” 28 May 2018). This post gives an update on existing and new initiatives. CAMELS (Catchment Attributes and MEteorology for Large-sample Studies) The CAMELS datasets are expanding: from the United States and Chile to Great Britain and Austr ...[Read More]
It’s time for another proper introduction of the blog team! As you will probably know, things have been a bit silent on the blog front lately. This is because all the blog editors were very busy and also: it’s hard to upload 52 times a year. You come up with some great blog ideas! (if you do: e-mail us, please!). Luckily, we used the EGU General Assembly to find some fresh blood for th ...[Read More]
