When I was thirteen years old, my family and I almost lost our lives due to a carbon monoxide (CO) leak. I never stopped thinking about that incident even though it happened over twenty years ago. Not only because it was a premature realisation of my own mortality, but also because of how sneaky it …[Read More]
Biogeosciences
GeoTalk: meet Kara Müller, researcher of biodegradable plastic!
Hello Kara. Thank you for joining this edition of GeoTalk! Could you tell our readers a little bit about yourself and your background? Thank you, Simon. I am excited to join you for the interview. I grew up in the middle of Germany in Bad Homburg, close to Frankfurt. After school, I travelled through Australia …[Read More]
Ocean hypoxia: what does the increase of dead zones mean for marine life?
When runoff from farmland and urban areas enters our streams and rivers, it carries a heavy load of fertilizers and nutrients. These substances accumulate and flow into our coastal oceans, triggering a series of reactions that can create hypoxic ‘dead zones’. Dead zones are low-oxygen, or hypoxic, areas in the world’s oceans and lakes. Because …[Read More]
Predators or gardeners: how penguins fertilise Antarctica’s biodiversity
On the desolate Antarctic peninsula, a colony of penguins creates a hub of biodiversity. One may ask, how exactly do those aquatic birds help maintain and enrich the variety of different kinds of organisms from plants and animals, to a wide range of insects and micro-organisms that live on our planet? The answer is quite …[Read More]
Soil bacteria that hunt like a wolfpack? Myxobacteria and their role in the food web
Picture this: bacteria that can slime their way around the soil, finding their prey, circling it, closing in on it and lysing it (or making their cell pop), just to feed on their prey. It sounds like a far stretch from a wolf to a bacteria, but even other soil predators, the comparably huge nematode …[Read More]
GeoPolicy: Fluvial geomorphology and its potential for policy impact
In this month’s GeoPolicy blog post, Dr Grace Skirrow outlines how researchers can share their expertise with environmental regulators to have policy impact and the role that fluvial geomorphology can play in policy decisions. Fluvial Geomorphology and why it is relevant for policymakers Fluvial Geomorphology (“fluvial”, derived from the Latin “fluvialis”, meaning “of the river”) …[Read More]
Biosphere Reserves: What are they and why must we care for them?
Today, 3 November, is globally recognized as the International Day for Biosphere Reserves. The first edition of this observance day was marked last year, with UNESCO urging our relationship with nature needed “a radical rethink.” As Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UNESCO explains, “The logic is simple: to improve our relationship with nature, we must first …[Read More]
Winners announced: Here are the best EGU Blog Posts of 2022!
As future-focused as we like to be at EGU, we sometimes pause to look back at the year gone by – just a brief glimpse to appreciate all the good work of 2022! As always, we had so many inspiring and thought-provoking blog posts published this year across the EGU’s official blog GeoLog and division blogs. …[Read More]
When nature isn’t “natural”: Reflections on World Wetlands Day
In 1821, peat cutters discovered a body similar to a mummy, pinned down by two wooden stakes deep in the mud. The body’s face still held red hair and a beard, their teeth were well preserved, and a hoop of willow was wrapped around their throat. But this wasn’t the dry, hot climate of Egypt …[Read More]
Congratulations to the winners of the EGU Best Blog Posts of 2021
At EGU, we like to believe that a new year is more meaningful when we pause to look back at the year gone by – just a brief glimpse to appreciate all our good work and progress! 2021 was certainly an excellent year for our blogging network at EGU. Across the EGU’s official blog, GeoLog …[Read More]