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27 April 2020
New Mexico badlands help researchers understand past Martian lava flows (video)
Planetary scientists are using a volcanic flow field in New Mexico to puzzle out how long past volcanic eruptions on Mars might have lasted, a finding that could help researchers determine if Mars was ever hospitable to life. People don’t usually think of New Mexico as a volcanically active place, but it has some of the youngest (geologically speaking) large lava flows in the continental United States.
19 December 2019
Survey reveals low awareness of volcanic hazards in Australia
On December 9, several Australians were among the dozens of tourists who were killed, injured, or went missing after a deadly eruption on Whakaari/White Island in New Zealand. Whakaari/White Island has seen more volcanic activity in the past 10 years than neighboring Australia has seen for 5,000, but according to volcanologists, the country is not free from the risks of a potential eruption. And according to a new survey, Australian citizens are mostly unaware of their country’s potential volcanic hazards.
5 August 2019
New study traces Io’s volcanic tides
Hundreds of volcanoes pockmark the surface of Io, the third largest of Jupiter’s 78 known moons, and the only body in our solar system other than Earth where widespread volcanism can be observed. A new study finds Io’s most powerful, persistent volcano, Loki Patera, brightens on a similar timescale to slight perturbations in Io’s orbit caused by Jupiter’s other moons, which repeat on an approximately 500-Earth-day cycle.
28 November 2018
New automated volcano warning system forecasts imminent eruptions
Scientists have developed an automated early warning system for volcanic eruptions, according to a new study. The new system helped government officials warn the public of impending eruptions in Italy and could potentially do the same around the globe, according to the study’s authors. The new research details the new system that monitors volcanic noises and automatically alerts officials if an eruption is imminent. The study’s authors tested this system over a period of eight years on Mount Etna, a volcano on the island of Sicily. Using the new system, the Italian government activated an emergency plan about one hour prior to an eruption for the first time in late 2015.
6 September 2018
Mysterious ‘lunar swirls’ point to moon’s volcanic, magnetic past
The mystery behind lunar swirls, one of the solar system’s most beautiful optical anomalies, may finally be solved thanks to a joint Rutgers University and University of California Berkeley study. The solution hints at the dynamism of the moon’s ancient past as a place with volcanic activity and an internally generated magnetic field. It also challenges our picture of the moon’s existing geology.
17 April 2018
Scientists decipher the magma bodies under Yellowstone
Using supercomputer modeling, scientists have unveiled a new explanation for the geology underlying recent seismic imaging of magma bodies below Yellowstone National Park.
4 April 2018
Infrasound recordings give scientists a peek inside volcano’s plume
High-resolution recordings of the powerful infrasound waves generated by an eruption at Ecuador’s Tungurahua volcano have given scientists a rare view inside the activity at the volcano’s mouth. The acoustic waves generated by the July 2013 eruption were one of the most powerful volcanic infrasound recordings ever captured. The low-frequency infrasound waves from the eruption are too low for human ears to hear but were as powerful as waves one meter (three feet) away from a jet engine.
30 March 2018
Wider coverage of satellite data better detects magma supply to volcanoes
Using satellite imaging, researchers for the first time identified a major magma supply into a reservoir extending almost two miles from the crater of a volcano in Nicaragua.
14 March 2018
Underwater volcano behavior captured by timely scientific expedition
Researchers got a rare opportunity to study an underwater volcano in the Caribbean when it erupted while they were surveying the area. The research, published online in the journal Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems, a journal of the American Geophysical Union, provides new insight into the little-studied world of underwater volcanoes. It investigated a volcano named Kick-‘em-Jenny (KeJ), which is thought to be named after the turbulent waters nearby.
17 January 2018
Scientists monitor volcanic gases with digital cameras to forecast eruptions
Scientists have shown for the first time that volcanoes emit distinctive pulses of gas a few hours before erupting, which could lead to real-time forecasting of dangerous volcanic eruptions that are difficult to predict, according to the researchers.
15 December 2017
Subterranean Serendipity: Scientists stumble upon a new way to sample magma
Scientists have never directly observed magma beneath the Earth’s surface. But thanks to the discovery of easily accessible magma chambers, it may now be possible, report scientists at the 2017 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting in New Orleans.
11 August 2017
“Heartbeats” of an underwater volcano’s eruption imaged by ultrasounds (plus VIDEO)
Using acoustic footage of a volcanic eruption and images taken by a remotely operated vehicle (ROV), scientists have documented an underwater volcano’s eruption off the coast of El Hierro, the smallest of the Canary Islands.
1 August 2017
Threat to the ozone layer by future volcanic eruptions greater than previously thought
As the CFCs slowly degrade over the coming decades, so too should the volcano’s ozone-destroying power. However, new research shows that the volcanic risk to the ozone layer will persist for decades longer than previously believed.
25 July 2017
Researchers uncover 200-year-old sunspot drawings in Maine
In April of 1815, the volcanic eruption of Mount Tambora in Indonesia caused a global decrease in temperatures for the following few years, and 1816 came to be known as the “year without a summer.” New England states were particularly hard hit by these temperature changes, which significantly affected agriculture production and quality of life. Alongside his journal entries, Reverend Jonathan Fisher of Blue Hill, Maine sketched the sunspots during the summer of 1816, thinking they might be responsible for the cold summer temperatures.
27 April 2017
Glass formed by volcanic lightning could be used to study eruptions
Researchers have developed a method to measure one of the most striking and difficult to measure volcanic features – volcanic lightning – using the tiny glass spheres formed by hot volcanic ash.
14 March 2017
Volcanic eruption expanded ozone hole to record size
On April 22, 2015, the Chilean volcano Calbuco erupted, spewing volcanic ash 10 kilometers (six miles) skyward. But Calbuco didn’t just tear a hole in the Earth that day. A new study suggests it also tore a hole in the sky.
13 March 2017
A perfect storm of fire and ice may have led to snowball Earth
Harvard University researchers have a new hypothesis about what caused the runaway glaciation that covered the Earth pole-to-pole in ice.
16 November 2016
Global warming could reduce volcanic cooling effects on climate
New research finds that as the climate warms, Earth’s atmosphere could trap more volcanic and plumes in the troposphere, the lower part of the atmosphere where weather happens. Volcanic aerosols that stay in the troposphere get washed out by precipitation in days or weeks.
12 July 2016
Dormant volcano near Rome is waking up
A long-dormant volcano outside Italy’s capital is entering a new eruptive cycle, a recently published study finds. Scientists previously assumed Colli Albani, a 15-kilometer (9-mile) semicircle of hills outside Rome, was an extinct volcano. But in recent years, scientists have observed new steam vents, earthquakes and a rise in ground level in the hills and surrounding area.
14 April 2016
AGU journal cover features work of Icelandic mouth painter
The AGU journal Geophysical Research Letters recently featured the work of mouth painter Brandur Bjarnason Karlsson on its cover. The image depicts the eruption at the Holuhraun lava field in Iceland, where magma originating from the Bárðarbunga volcano spewed out of eruptive fissures from August 2014 to February 2015. The spectacular eruption is the subject of a new study in GRL co-authored by Brandur’s mother, Bryndis Brandsdottir, a senior researcher at the Institute of Earth Science at the University of Iceland.
