Imja Lake is one of the largest glacial lakes in the Nepal Himalaya and has received a great deal of attention in the last couple decades due to the potential for a glacial lake outburst flood. In response to these concerns, the UNDP has funded a project that is currently lowering the level of the lake by 3 m to reduce the flood hazard. The aim of our research efforts is to understand how quickly ...[Read More]
This bag belongs to Joshua Dean, Postdoc, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Field Work location Far Eastern Siberian Arctic: Kytalyk Nature Reserve. Duration of field work 2 weeks plus 3 days travel either side. Items in the bag Detecto Pak-Infrared (DP-IR) gas analyser [borrowed from colleagues, protect at all costs] EGM4 CO2 gas analyser [borrowed from another department, protect at all costs] water ...[Read More]
The EGU blog network is getting a make-over! Since 2013 the network blogs have enjoyed thought-provoking and engaging contributions by Simon Redfern, Dan Schillereff and Laura Roberts, Jon Tennant, as well as Will Morgan on a range of topics: from the workings of the inner Earth, through to geomorphology, palaeontology and air quality. However, the individual circumstances of the bloggers now mean ...[Read More]
Picture a glacier and you probably imagine a vast, dense mass of slow moving ice; the likes of which you’d expect to see atop the planet’s high peaks and at high latitudes. Now, what if not all glaciers look like that? Take some ice, mix in some rock, snow and maybe a little mud and the result is a rock glacier. Unlike ice glaciers (the ones we are most familiar with), rock glaciers have very litt ...[Read More]
An increasing global population means that we are more dependant than ever on soils. Soils are crucial to securing our future supplies of water, food, as well as aiding adaptation to climate change and sustaining the planet’s biosphere; yet with the decrease in human labour dedicated to working the land, never have we been more out of touch with the vital importance of this natural resource. Now, ...[Read More]
Antarctica is separated from the deep Southern Ocean by a shallow continental shelf. Waters are exchanged between the deep ocean and the shallow shelf, forming the Antarctic cross-shelf circulation: Very dense waters leave the shelf as Antarctic Bottom Water (AABW) that will then flow at the bottom of all oceans. Meanwhile, relatively warm water from the Southern Ocean, Modified Circumpolar Deep W ...[Read More]
As one of the executive editors of Solid Earth, one of my main duties is to keep up the journal’s reputation and a high quality of published articles. For a manuscript to be considered as a candidate for publication, it is necessary to fall within the scope of the journal. But, in my opinion, it also needs to show “new science”: innovation in the methods or approaches, sound resu ...[Read More]
The huge fold in the flank of the 2969 m high Dent de Morcles (in Waadtland Alps, Switzerland) is an impressive testimony to the collision between Africa and Europe (which began some 65 million years ago). The layers, originally deposited on the sea floor in a horizontal position, were compressed and shifted. The darker parts developed during the Tertiary period (66 million years ago). They are yo ...[Read More]
No need to be a superhero to momentarily escape your everyday life! For that you, can just rely on the EGU Cryosphere Blog, which cares for taking you on trips to all sorts of remote and cool places (OK, OK we have to admit that some of these places are indisputably cold :-)). The picture of this week was taken through the porthole of a boat in the middle of Isfjorden, one of the largest fjord in ...[Read More]
In November 2014, space exploration history was made. Millions of kilometres away, orbiting a piece of ice and rock, the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Rosetta mission sent its probe Philae to become the first spacecraft to soft-land on a comet. After the tense 7-hour wait that followed the separation from the main orbiter, a tweet confirmed that the little lander had successfully completed the fir ...[Read More]
