On Wednesday morning I woke up to a flurry of activity on my twitter feed: there had been a large earthquake in northern Chile. I followed up some of the tweets and realised that there had also been some tsunami warnings as a result of the earthquake. After ascertaining that the scale of the disaster wasn’t as large as I’d anticipated, given the size of the quake (I don’t want you to think for one ...[Read More]
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Soil System Sciences
Boring Soil Science strikes back
Many scientists are currently debating whether soil science is an academic field in which scientists are engaged in talking to each other, ignoring the rest of society. Of course, traditionally, the dissemination of soil science has been a difficult field. Among other problems, some scientists have reviewed the use of complicated jargon. Soil Science academics work in increasingly smaller and smal ...[Read More]
Polluting the Internet
UK Air Pollution: March/April 2014
Air pollution over the UK has been high on the agenda today with the media covering the widespread build up of aerosol pollution since the end of last week. This has led to health concerns, particularly for vulnerable groups such as children, the elderly and people with pre-existing heart and lung conditions. This follows the recent event in mid-March, which I covered here and saw Paris take measu ...[Read More]
Seismology
Earthquake shakes Twitter users and geeks do some science (oh, and celebrities said they felt it too)
The ever increasing use of mobile phones constantly connected to the internet is bring on a new era in scientific research called crowdsourcing. On Wikipedia crowdsourcing is the defined as the practice of obtaining needed services, ideas, or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people, and especially from an online community. In recent years social media is being used as a re ...[Read More]
Geology for Global Development
Opportunity: Landslide Posters for Teaching
Geology for Global Development are involved in an international project on Sustainable Resource Development of the Himalaya (see www.gfgd.org/projects/himalayas2014), which will cumulate in the delivery of a students’ programme in Ladakh, India, in June 2014. The programme will include lessons on resources, climate, earthquakes and landslides. GfGD have particular responsibility for delivering the ...[Read More]
GeoLog
Short courses at EGU 2014
This year there is a suite of super short courses to choose from at the General Assembly. You can supercharge your scientific skills, broaden your base in science communication and pick up tips on how to boost your career – be it in academia or outside. Here’s what’s in store at EGU 2014: Supercharge your science – new techniques and dealing with data Scale, scaling and multifractals i ...[Read More]
GeoLog
Imaggeo on Mondays: A rolling stone gathers no moss
Philippe Leloup brings us this week’s Imaggeo on Mondays, with tales from a mountain trail that show a geologist can never resist a good rock! This image is that of a polished slab of a rock composed of interlayered marbles and amphibolites. The sample was once part of a small dry-stone wall bordering an outdoor kitchen along a trail along the Ailao Mountain Range in China (or Ailao Shan in Chines ...[Read More]
Geology for Global Development
Help us Teach Hazards in the Himalayas
Geology for Global Development are involved in an international project on Sustainable Resource Development of the Himalaya (see www.gfgd.org/projects/himalayas2014), which will cumulate in the delivery of a students’ programme in Ladakh, India, in June 2014. The programme will include lessons on resources, climate, earthquakes and landslides. GfGD have particular responsibility for delivering the ...[Read More]
Soil System Sciences
Monday paper: Interplay of riparian forest and groundwater in the hillslope hydrology of Sudanian West Africa (northern Benin)
Richard, A., Galle, S., Descloitres, M., Cohard, J.-M., Vandervaere, J.-P., Séguis, L., and Peugeot, C. 2013. Interplay of riparian forest and groundwater in the hillslope hydrology of Sudanian West Africa (northern Benin), Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 17, 5079-5096. DOI: 10.5194/hess-17-5079-2013. Abstract Forests are thought to play an important role in the regional dynamics of the West A ...[Read More]
Soil System Sciences
Soil color never lies
Often, soil color is described using general terms such as “brown”, “red”, “dark”, etc. When I talk about this issue for the first time with my students of Soil Science, I use to ask them how to describe the color of a soil sample. Normally, in a few seconds, I get a list of color names ranging from dark brown to bright red, including “chocolate”, “coffee” and “ ...[Read More]