Divisions

Biogeosciences

Coffee break biogeosciences–The oldest known fossilized active root meristem

Rachael Moore July 1, 2016

Meristems are groups of undifferentiated cells found in growth zones of plants. Active meristem zones have a different cellular organization than inactive zones, and up until recently no fossilized active root meristem had been found. A team of scientists recently found and described the fossilized remains of an actively growing root meristem dating from the Carboniferous. The fossil, named Radix ...[Read More]

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Seismology

MyShake – your phone as a seismic station

Laura Ermert July 1, 2016

Are you on Facebook or Twitter? Do you use Whatsapp regularly to communicate with friends and loved ones scattered across the globe or even just across the city? I’d be surprised if you answer ‘no’ to all of these questions. In fact, why not admit that you are just as addicted to that smartphone of yours as I am to mine? Being a seismologist, you might have played with one of the ...[Read More]

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Cryospheric Sciences

Image of The Week – A Game of Drones (Part 1: A Debris-Covered Glacier)

Matt Westoby July 1, 2016

What are debris-covered glaciers? Many alpine glaciers are covered with a layer of surface debris (rock and sediment), which is sourced primarily from glacier headwalls and valley flanks. So-called ‘debris-covered glaciers’ are found in most glacierized regions, with concentrations in the European Alps, the Caucasus, Hindu-Kush-Himalaya, Karakoram and Tien Shan, the Andes, and Alaska and the weste ...[Read More]

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Seismology

A tale about MERMAIDs

Kathrin Spieker June 24, 2016

Once upon a time there was a little mermaid, with the upper body of a human and a tail of a fish, happily diving within the seven seas. Wait … I’m sorry, that is the wrong story. I will tell you today something about a different generation of MERMAIDs, that are pretty useful for seismologists. It is a very exciting story indeed. Over the last decades seismic station coverage dra ...[Read More]

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Cryospheric Sciences

Image of the Week – Canyons Under The Greenland Ice Sheet!

Michael Cooper June 24, 2016

The Greenland Ice Sheet contains enough water to raise sea level by 7.36 meters (Bamber, et. al. 2013) and much of this moves from the interior of the continent into the oceans via Jakobshavn Isbræ – Greenland’s fastest flowing outlet glacier. An ancient river basin hidden beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet, discovered by researchers at the University of Bristol, may help explain the loca ...[Read More]

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Cryospheric Sciences

Marine Ice Sheet Instability “For Dummies”

David Docquier June 22, 2016

MISI is a term that is often thrown into dicussions and papers which talk about the contribution of Antarctica to sea-level rise but what does it actually mean and why do we care about it? MISI stands for Marine Ice Sheet Instability. In this article, we are going to attempt to explain this term to you and also show you why it is so important. Background The Antarctic Ice Sheet represents the larg ...[Read More]

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Seismology

Paper of the Month — the first of a (hopefully) long series!

Laura Parisi June 17, 2016

“TRIANGULAR DISLOCATION: AN ANALYTICAL, ARTIFACT-FREE SOLUTION” (by Mehdi Nikkhoo and Thomas R. Walter) COMMENTED BY OLAF ZIELKE “Paper of the Month” is a new blog series launched by the ECS-reps team. The aim is to absorb and share the reading experience of mature seismologists with regards to peer-review articles either recently published (less than 12 months) or older, if of particular no ...[Read More]

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Cryospheric Sciences

Image of The Week – Ballooning on the Ice

Nanna B. Karlsson June 17, 2016

A curious experiment is taking place in Greenland. An experiment involving very large balloons and – of course – a lot of snow. Read on to discover why balloons are an environmentally friendly tool when constructing an ice core drill camp. Last year, a small team traversed 400km from northwest Greenland to the EastGRIP site (read more about the traverse here). This year another strenuous task is w ...[Read More]

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Biogeosciences

Keeping a lookout at the edge of the world

Jasper Bloemen June 10, 2016

Few places in the world conjure up images of remoteness and harshness like Far Eastern Siberia. Yet, it’s places like these where our science is needed most. Arctic soils hold vast amount of carbon, protected in thick layers of permafrost, but these stores are becoming more and more vulnerable as temperatures in the Arctic warm, and are set to warm faster than anywhere else on the planet. R ...[Read More]

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Cryospheric Sciences

Image of the week — The warming effect of the decline of Arctic Sea Ice

Chris Horvat June 10, 2016

One of the most dramatic signals of Earth’s recent warming has been the precipitous decline of the Arctic sea ice. While the sea-ice decline is in response to warming ocean and atmosphere, it also has an important feed-back on the climate itself. Solar radiation and albedo Earth’s main energy source is solar radiation. This solar radiation is either absorbed in the atmosphere or at the ...[Read More]