EGU Blogs

Divisions

HS
Hydrological Sciences

Amilcare Porporato (2020 John Dalton Medallist) on agile models for complex systems in the environmental sciences

July 15, 2020
Amilcare Porporato (2020 John Dalton Medallist) on agile models for complex systems in the environmental sciences

The EGU 2020 John Dalton Medal of the EGU Division on Hydrological Sciences was awarded to Amilcare Porporato for his contributions to the field of ecohydrology and for developing new theories for the analysis of soil-plant-atmosphere systems across scales. Given the online EGU 2020 GA, the medal lecture is postponed to 2021. In April, Amilcare wrote the post below to the HS community. I’m very ha ...[Read More]

GD
Geodynamics

What controls Victoria microplate rotation in the East African Rift?

July 15, 2020
Lake Magadi, Kenya.

This week in News & Views, Anne Glerum, postdoc at GFZ Potsdam, discusses how her numerical models support a lithosphere-driven mechanism for the rotation of large continental microplates, like Victoria in the East African Rift System. The East African Rift System (EARS) is a newly forming divergent boundary between the Nubian and Somalian plates (Fig. 1). The plate boundary system includes se ...[Read More]

TS
Tectonics and Structural Geology

Istanbul: The city across two continents

July 13, 2020
Istanbul: The city across two continents

Istanbul – an economic, cultural, and historic centre. Its unique geography, natural resources and beauty have drawn the attention of not only geoscientists but also poets, merchants, painters, sculptors, architects, kings and emperors for centuries. Throughout its history, the city has witnessed the rise and fall of some of the world’s greatest empires. Owing to its geopolitically important ...[Read More]

CR
Cryospheric Sciences

The future of Arctic sea ice

July 10, 2020
The future of Arctic sea ice

The illustration above shows a sketch of the evolution of Arctic sea ice for different levels of warming and the different months of the year, based on the simple extrapolation of observations. A new study, in which I was involved, uses the latest available global climate models and shows that the Arctic Ocean could become practically ice free at the end of the summer for the first time before 205 ...[Read More]

GD
Geodynamics

The Sassy Scientist – Egghead Entertainment

July 10, 2020
The Sassy Scientist – Egghead Entertainment

Yu-Seok has depleted his streaming service queue, thrown all of the stocked board games off the table, and eagerly seeks new ways to squander his energy after a long workday of couch-surfing underneath his laptop: What should a scientist do as a pastime? Dear Yu-Seok, Where can you find the time? And the energy? Aren’t we all simply working continuously? I go to extremes to even find the energy an ...[Read More]

NP
Nonlinear Processes in Geosciences

NPG Paper Highlight: “Baroclinic and barotropic instabilities in planetary atmospheres: energetics, equilibration and adjustment”

July 9, 2020
NPG Paper Highlight: “Baroclinic and barotropic instabilities in planetary atmospheres: energetics, equilibration and adjustment”

Today’s our blog hosts a review article by the 2016 EGU Richardson medallist Peter Read, together with Daniel Kennedy, Neil Lewis, Hélène Scolan, Fachreddin Tabataba-Vakili, YixiongWang, Susie Wright, and Roland Young for the special issue of NPG celebrating 100 years of IUGG (https://npg.copernicus.org/articles/27/147/2020/npg-27-147-2020.html). One of the great achievements of the past 100 ...[Read More]

GD
Geodynamics

Understanding intraplate earthquakes

July 8, 2020
Understanding intraplate earthquakes

  One of the basic tenets of plate tectonics states that deformation occurs along plate boundaries while plate interiors remain almost undeformed. Intraplate earthquakes  defy this principle and hence are quite enigmatic.  In this week’s News and Views, Prof. Attreyee Ghosh from the Centre for Earth Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, tries to explain the reasons behind intraplate ea ...[Read More]

NH
Natural Hazards

DE BELLO VULCANICO 40-year scientific effort of ‘predicting the unpredictable’ since the 1980 eruption of Mount Saint Helens

July 6, 2020
DE BELLO VULCANICO 40-year scientific effort of ‘predicting the unpredictable’ since the 1980 eruption of Mount Saint Helens

Volcanoes arouse emotions in the soul of men: at the same time, they are fascinating and frighten the population that lives on their slopes when they erupt (Fig. 1). Volcanoes can strike without warning and wreak horrific destruction and death. As such, in the ancient time, volcanoes discharging explosive eruptions have been interpreted as the wrath of gods that destroys and annihilates all around ...[Read More]

SSS
Soil System Sciences

#Black in Soil Science

July 6, 2020
#Black in Soil Science

Inspired by the recent #Black in Geoscience blog post on the EGU Geodynamics Division blog, we decided to highlight Black soil scientists in a separate blog post! As we already mentioned on Twitter, our Soil System Sciences Division Outreach team is busy thinking about what we can do about the lack of diversity, esp. for Black soil scientists in our scientific community. Specifically, how can we i ...[Read More]

Geochemistry, Mineralogy, Petrology & Volcanology

#MINERALMONDAY: Bismuth

July 6, 2020
#MINERALMONDAY: Bismuth

It’s not so common for us to think about pure metals as minerals, or even crystals, but just like pinocchio could be a real boy, pure metals can be minerals too. This is because, if the metal cools down from a melt very slowly, layers of metal atoms can add onto previously solidified atoms, forming a defined lattice of atoms, and ta-dahh, it’s a single crystal! This is different from m ...[Read More]