Highlights from Tuesday 15 Dec. at #AGU20

If you missed some sessions from Tuesday, 15 December, don’t worry – you can check them out, along with all other sessions, on demand until 15 February. Here are some suggestions for sessions to watch – or re-watch:

• John Fitzpatrick, noted ornithologist and executive director of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, enlightened #AGU20 attendees about how birds can help us save our planet and the importance of community science in the Community Science Plenary.
• Leaders of AGU, EGU, JpGU, GSA, and ESA discussed the future roles and responsibilities of societies in a COVID and post-COVID world; recurring themes included assisting younger scientists and engagement with and for society. This session followed a related session Monday featuring academic leaders.
• Andrew P. Roberts delivered the Edward Bullard Lecture, Mineral Magnetism: Some Surprises and Future Challenges.
• Innovative sessions explored sustainable development in the Anthropocene and connected researchers working with remotely sensed data with indigenous community members who shared their knowledge and their story of that place, along with visual elements from that location.
• Town halls featured US CLIVAR and the U.S. Department of Energy, and discussed climate change education and engaging in policy and advocacy.

Some other notable sessions:

• C059 – High Mountains as Harbingers of Change I
• GP008 – Paleointensity: Models, Simulations, Instruments, Experimental Methods, and Results II Posters
• GH015 – Using NASA Satellite Data to Advance Environmental Health Applications: Impact of Changing Global Ecosystems on Human Health II Posters
• P074 – The Uranus and Neptune Systems and Their Relation to Other Planets I
• MR011 – Pre-, Co-, and Post-Rupture Processes Across Multiple Scales I
• DI025 – A Multidisciplinary Approach to Understanding Volatiles in Earth’s Mantle I
• H173 – Water and Society: Water Resources Management and Policy in a Changing World I
• B099 – The Resilience and Vulnerability of Arctic and Boreal Ecosystems to Climate Change III
• GC106 – Use of Earth Observations in Mitigating Major Environmental Challenges in the Americas I
• SM044 – The MacGyver Session: The Place for Novel, Exciting, Self-Made, Hacked, or Improved Sensors and Software Solutions to Understand Space Weather eLightning
• NS010 – Geophysical Methods for Groundwater Evaluation and Management I

Posters to check out:

• https://twitter.com/Dr_Mark_Torres/status/1338550050448957440
• https://twitter.com/marideeweber/status/1338518434292887554
• https://twitter.com/gk_macdonald/status/1338553681281765377
• https://twitter.com/MikeQuake/status/1338557862407180295
• https://twitter.com/DrLauraMeredith/status/1338560293174046720
• https://twitter.com/iWERS_UofSC/status/1338564268296376326
• https://twitter.com/BoilingWoo/status/1338564639425089537
• https://twitter.com/Lise_Comte/status/1338565004648472577

News from #AGU20:

• Long-Term Drought Harms Mental Health in Rural Communities. Eos, 15 December. In rural and remote communities in Australia, psychological distress worsened during the first few years of a prolonged drought. Other signs of poor mental health persisted beyond that time.
• When Did Archaic Humans Control Fire? Eos, 15 December. A familiar geochemical technique shines a new spotlight on early hominin use of fire.
• Hurricane Maria Killed Mangroves Months After Storm. Eos, 15 December. An overgrown channel between a lagoon and the ocean on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques created a backup of freshwater, disrupting the delicate balance of salinity in coastal mangrove forests.
• New Volcano, Old Caldera. Eos, 15 December. Researchers suggest a magma chamber sits within an old submarine caldera structure that extends into the mantle. Nearby, a new underwater volcano emerged with a flurry of seismicity.
• Towering fire-fueled thunderclouds can spew as many aerosols as volcanic eruptions. Science News, 15 December. A massive tower of smoke generated by Australian wildfires in late 2019 set a new record for the loftiest and largest fire-spawned thunderstorms ever measured.
• Polar cyclones on Jupiter create a spellbinding vortex cluster. Live Science, 15 December. Stunning new images show the swirling mass of cyclones at Jupiter’s north pole.

Who are you watching with? James Rae is taking in #AGU20 with a special viewer.

Note: not all recordings of live sessions may be available at the time of this post, but they will be available in the coming days. Please check the online platform for updates.