“Human influence on the climate system is clear” was the key message from the report on the physical science of climate change from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). “We have come a long way since the first IPCC report was published in 1990,” a statement reiterated throughout the press conference for the release of the report. The IPCC were keen to register the significance of ...[Read More]
A sky-high view on pollution in the Himalayas: the science
Jane Qiu shares her experience of shadowing atmospheric scientists some 5000 metres above sea level after being awarded the EGU’s science journalism fellowship. To find out how she got there, see her last post, A sky-high view on pollution in the Himalayas: the journey. Lab with a view After six days of strenuous hike, the Pyramid was finally in sight. At the foot of the majestic Khumbu Glacier, ...[Read More]
Imaggeo on Mondays: Eddy covariance
This week’s Imaggeo on Mondays is brought to you by Jean-Daniel Paris, a meteorologist from the Climate and Environmental Sciences Laboratory (LSCE), France. He describes how new techniques like eddy covariance tell us about the flux of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere… This picture was taken during a visit to the Hyytiälä research station in Finland in June 2010. This station runs flux ...[Read More]
Geosciences column: Playing back the Antarctic ice records
Satellites are keeping tabs on the state of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, and have observed considerable declines in ice extent in many areas since records began, but what do we know of past sea ice extent? Ice cores keep an excellent record of climate change, but until recently, ice cores have not been used to quantify patterns in past sea ice extent because few reliable compounds are preserved i ...[Read More]
A sky-high view on pollution in the Himalayas: the journey
After being awarded the EGU’s science journalism fellowship, Jane Qiu took to the Himalayas to shadow scientists studying air pollution at the Pyramid Observatory some 5000 metres above sea level. The journey to work is by no means an easy one… For Angela Marinoni and Paolo Bonasoni, climate scientists at the Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate in Bologna, Italy, and Maxime Hervo, a Ph.D ...[Read More]
Imaggeo on Mondays: Great faults and faultless geotourism
Road cuttings provide a great window into the wonders of what’s beneath the Earth’s surface. In this week’s Imaggeo on Mondays Bahram Sadry takes us through a beautiful fault between Tabriz and Tehran, Iran… These incredible rock outcroppings along Zanjan-Tabriz highway (the northwest of Iran), are unlike any other outcrop in the world. They are a group of faults and fractures, brecciation and gra ...[Read More]
Momentous discoveries in oceanography
Earlier this month, one of our network bloggers, Matt Herod, put out a call for posts on momentous discoveries in geology as part of a well-known geoscience blog carnival, The Accretionary Wedge. With so many geoscience disciplines to choose from, and an immense wealth of exciting discoveries across the Earth sciences, choosing just one momentous discovery was no easy task. Much of my background i ...[Read More]
Applications for the 2014 GIFT workshop are open!
Every year, the EGU Committee on Education organises a workshop that spreads first-hand scientific information to teachers. The theme of this year’s Geosciences Information For Teachers (GIFT) workshop is Our Changing Planet and it will be taking place on April 27–30 2014 at the EGU General Assembly in Vienna, Austria. The workshop will explore some of the recent complex changes of our environment ...[Read More]
Imaggeo on Mondays: Surface spirals
This week’s Imaggeo on Mondays is no ordinary image; it’s a snapshot of surface ocean speeds and the extent of ice cover in the North Atlantic. It was produced using a high resolution model of ocean eddies – high resolution here means that details are simplified into grids 3 km across, or one 20th of a degree. Three kilometres may sound like a pretty large area, but in oceanographic modelling, thi ...[Read More]
Geosciences Column: Stitching the seafloor together
You’re standing on a mountain peak, with a fabulous field site before you. Wanting to capture the moment, you take out your iPhone, snap a dozen pictures and your mobile stitches them together beautifully – a nice record to show your colleagues back in the office. Unfortunately, not all field sites are so easy to capture – especially when you need to do a little science with the images. Seafloor p ...[Read More]