You are browsing the archive for Geology Archives - Page 5 of 8 - GeoSpace.
4 August 2016
The Geoscience Papers of the Future: a modern publication strategy for data management and scientific publication
Many data used in scientific papers are not accessible by reading the papers, which makes it difficult to understand and reuse. To effectively communicate data results and preserve observations, simulations, and predictions, the Geoscience Papers of the Future was launched in 2015.
15 July 2016
Drought caused the Amazon to stop storing carbon
The most extensive land-based study of the effect of drought on Amazonian rainforests to date has shown that a recent drought completely shut down the Amazon Basin’s carbon sink. Previous research has suggested that the Amazon – the most extensive tropical forest on Earth – may be gradually losing its capacity to take carbon from the atmosphere. This new study paints a more complex picture, with forests responding dynamically to an increasingly variable climate.
25 May 2016
Flyover Country—The next generation field-based research tool
In December 2015, with the support of a National Science Foundation (NSF) EAGER grant, the Flyover Country (FC) team of Amy Myrbo (University of Minnesota Research Associate), Shane Loeffler (2015 B.S. graduate of the University of Minnesota Duluth), Reed McEwan (University of Minnesota M.S. in Geology and Software Engineering) and Sijia Ai (University of Minnesota), launched FC as a geosciences mobile app for air travelers, road warriors and hikers.
23 May 2016
History of Greenland snowfall hidden in ancient leaf waxes
The history of Greenland’s snowfall is chronicled in an unlikely place: the remains of aquatic plants that died long ago, collecting at the bottom of lakes in horizontal layers that document the passing years. Using this ancient record, scientists are attempting to reconstruct how Arctic precipitation fluctuated over the past several millennia, potentially influencing the size of the Greenland Ice Sheet as the Earth warmed and cooled.
11 May 2016
North Dakota’s Bakken oil and gas field leaking 275,000 tons of methane per year
Researchers found that 275,000 tons of methane leak from the Bakken oil and gas field each year, similar to the emission rate found for another oil-producing region, Colorado’s Denver-Julesburg Basin. That’s the finding of the first field study measuring emissions of this potent greenhouse gas from the Bakken, which spans parts of North Dakota and Montana.
13 April 2016
2012 Texas earthquakes may have been man-made
Analysis of a series of earthquakes in East Texas in 2012 has found it plausible that the earthquakes were caused by wastewater injection. Previous studies relied on the timing and proximity of wastewater injection to earthquakes to decide if earthquakes were induced by human activity. This was the first to simulate the mechanics of an earthquake generated by water injection for this site.
5 April 2016
Melt-driven streams on Greenland’s ice sheet shape landscapes faster than rivers on land
Erosion by summertime melt-driven streams on Greenland’s ice sheet shapes landscapes similarly to, but much faster, than do rivers on land, according to a new study. The approach used to study the drainage system of the ice sheet should serve to broaden the scientific understanding of melt rates and improve projections about ice sheet response to climate change, said Leif Karlstrom, a geologist at the University of Oregon in Eugene and lead author of the study.
20 January 2016
Going digital: Building a better geological map of Alaska
In the early 1900s, before Alaska was part of the United States, geologists roamed this northern territory on foot and horseback, noting its features and terrain on hand-drawn maps. Nearly 100 years later in 1996, U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) research geologist Frederic Wilson and a dozen colleagues undertook the task of using some of the information contained in these field notes, sketches and maps, along with many other sources of data, to create the first fully digitalized geological map of Alaska.
17 December 2015
Hillslopes and Hobbes
Stanford University’s Miles Traer, once again, is cartooning from the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco.
15 December 2015
Cold reaction has hot implications for evolution of life
When carbon dioxide and hydrogen gas mingle deep underground, they transform into methane and water—the building blocks of life.
Scientists once thought the reaction, called Sabatier synthesis, could only proceed above 150 degrees Celsius. Life, they thought, was conceived deep in the scalding vents of an ancient ocean. But the Sabatier process also runs cooler, finds a new study presented at the 2015 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting. With the right catalyst, the reaction works at room temperature, the study found.
GeoSpace is a blog on Earth and space science, managed by AGU’s Public Information staff. The blog features posts by AGU writers and guest contributors on all sorts of relevant science topics, but with a focus on new research and geo and space sciences-related stories that are currently in the news.