Agu on EARTH Magazine

Travels in Geology: Touring the Capital Geology of Washington, D.C.

Fri, 09 Nov 2018 10:06:48 -0500

The rushing whitewater and jagged rocks of Great Falls, along the Potomac River about 20 kilometers upstream of downtown Washington, D.C., make for one of the most striking natural scenes in the metropolitan area. Here, the river is gradually incising the Piedmont province's hard rocks, oceanic sedimentary rocks that were metamorphosed during Appalachian mountain building roughly 460 million years ago. Credit: ©iStockphoto.com/DouglasRissing.

Washington, D.C., is one of the biggest centers of power on the planet — a nexus of domestic and international politics, backroom deal-making and patriotic reflection. But there is so much more to D.C. than politics. Among its other attributes, the D.C. metro area is a powerhouse of scientific research, and more specifically geoscience research. It’s home to institutions like the U.S. Geological Survey, the Carnegie Institution for Science, the Smithsonian Institution, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and the headquarters of NASA and NOAA, along with a slew of universities, advisory and lobbying groups such as the National Academy of Sciences, the American Geosciences Institute (which publishes EARTH) and the American Geophysical Union, which this month will host its annual fall meeting in the city. D.C. is also home to numerous longstanding geological interest groups, including the Potomac Geophysical Society, the Paleontological Society of Washington and the 125-year-old Geological Society of Washington.

Science as a family affair

Fri, 03 Aug 2018 12:11:16 -0400

The Weiss family at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in December 2017 in New Orleans. From left to right: father Chad, Cameron, 15, Sean, 16, Ian, 13, Megan, 15, Evan, 15, and mother Nicola. Credit: Harvey Leifert.

Ian Weiss had already taken off his shoes and socks when he realized he’d left his lacrosse stick in the car one day in May 2015. He went to retrieve it, stepping barefoot onto the asphalt street outside his family’s Southern California home. “While opening the trunk I had to do the hot-feet dance on the pavement,” he recalls. It was a pivotal moment in more ways than one for Ian, then a sixth-grade student at Samuel E. Talbert Middle School in Huntington Beach, Calif.

Is aviation 'whitening' the sky?

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 21:55:56 -0500

Clear blue skies may not be as clear as they appear. Skies are actually becoming less clear, causing incoming sunlight to scatter in different directions, rather than striking the planet directly — and aviation may be to blame, according to research presented this week at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in San Francisco.

Did three convicts survive their escape from Alcatraz? Modern modeling adds to a decades-old mystery

Wed, 14 Jan 2015 10:11:00 -0500

The former Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay. Credit: Jon Sullivan, public domain

Twenty-first century science is shedding new light on a 53-year-old mystery involving one of the country’s most notorious prisons: Did three convicted bank robbers survive their escape attempt from Alcatraz Island? New results, presented at the American Geophysical Union’s (AGU) annual meeting in San Francisco last December, suggest there’s a chance they did.

Bare Earth Elements: Past and present directors dissect the future of USGS

Mon, 22 Dec 2014 17:00:37 -0500

USGS headquarters in Reston, Va. Credit: U.S. Geological Survey/photo by Don Becker

December tends to be a busy time for geoscientists — likewise for those of us who cover and write about work in the field. Part of that annual year-end hustle and bustle is due to the timing of the American Geophysical Union’s (AGU) annual fall meeting, which brings together tens of thousands of scientists, exhibitors and others (including science writers and reporters) for a week’s worth of research talks, poster presentations, press conferences, workshops and countless other events.

Comet ISON still intrigues and inspires, even after its demise

Wed, 11 Dec 2013 16:20:44 -0500

“Comet ISON is dead, but its memory will live on." That eulogy for the much-discussed “comet of the century" was delivered today by Karl Battams of the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C., during a series of reports presented at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in San Francisco, Calif. In response to queries from reporters seeking a definitive statement on the fate of the comet that rounded the sun in late November, Battams noted that both amateur and professional astronomers had combed the area of the sky where ISON would now be had it survived, and there is simply no trace of it.

Juno salutes its home planet and heads to Jupiter

Wed, 11 Dec 2013 12:07:06 -0500

Thanks to orbital mechanics, a spacecraft heading to Jupiter must go most of the way there, then loop around the sun, zoom back close to Earth, and finally head out again on its mission to the largest planet in the solar system. That's the story of Juno, launched by NASA on Aug. 5, 2011, and due to arrive at Jupiter on July 4, 2016. Its journey required a boost in velocity, relative to the sun, which it received when it flew as close as 559 kilometers above Earth on Oct. 9, 2013. Juno’s flyby of its home planet took it over several continents, with its lowest approach occurring over Cape Town, South Africa.

Be prepared: Navigating the risks of hazards research

Tue, 10 Dec 2013 09:48:01 -0500

Kathleen Cantner, AGI

Background photo shows a debris flow along a stream triggered by the remnants of Hurricane Ivan in September 2004 in Macon County, N.C. It killed four people and destroyed 16 homes and structures. Left inset: A home close to the stream was destroyed. Right inset: A home set back from the stream was spared. This landslide, along with hundreds of others in the western North Carolina mountains, spurred the legislature to pass the Hurricane Recovery Act of 2005, authorizing creation of the North Carolina Geological Survey Landslide Hazard Mapping Program. The intent of this program was to make people more aware of landslide hazards in the mountains and to provide a tool for planning and emergency management courtesy of North Carolina Geological Survey (NCGS )

Penn State climatologist Michael Mann recently wrote about legal battles over his research and findings in The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars. Greg Rico, courtesy of Michael Mann

At the 2012 and 2013 annual meetings, AGU offered scientists the opportunity to educate themselves about legal issues by offering access to a "Lawyer in a Box." Kathleen Cantner, AGI

Just over a year ago, in a cavernous room of the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco, Calif., hundreds of geophysicists, seismologists, volcanologists and climate scientists, as well as a few journalists and a lawyer or two, sat transfixed as a panel discussed the manslaughter conviction of six scientists and a public official in Italy a few months earlier. The Italian scientists and official had been accused of giving misleading advice to the public — failing to communicate the seismic risk, based on their knowledge — ahead of a magnitude-6.3 earthquake in April 2009 in the city of L’Aquila that killed 309 people.

Curiosity finds an ancient habitable environment in Mars' Gale Crater

Mon, 09 Dec 2013 16:19:01 -0500

San Francisco - Yellowknife Bay is named for Yellowknife, the capital of Canada’s Northwest Territories, but is nowhere near that subarctic city. It is not even on Earth, but is the focus of intense interest among scores of Earthbound geologists, biologists and astronomers. Yellowknife Bay is a geologic formation on Mars in the 154-kilometer-wide Gale Crater. The Curiosity rover, also known as the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), has been exploring that crater for more than a year. Scientists on the MSL research team think the “bay” offers convincing evidence of an ancient lake that provided an environment that could have supported microbial life.

Two NASA spacecraft reveal ancient underground cracks from moon's formation

Thu, 06 Dec 2012 00:45:47 -0500

This graphic shows the density of the lunar highlands on the near and far sides of the moon as generated using gravity data from NASA's GRAIL mission and topography data from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. Red corresponds to higher than average densities and blue to lower than average densities; white corresponds to basalt.

SAN FRANCISCO: The face of the moon has always enchanted humankind, but new data from a NASA mission have given scientists a glimpse of what lies beneath the surface. A new, highly detailed map of the moon’s gravity has revealed evidence of underground cracks created by its hot, molten center as it came into shape billions of years ago, a team of scientists announced today at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco.

Satellites can detect underground nuclear explosions

Wed, 05 Dec 2012 12:15:52 -0500

SAN FRANCISCO: If you’re looking for hints of an underground nuclear explosion, the last place you might think to look is up. But it turns out that the sky is a great place to look for clues, because satellites provide scientists with a way to locate the waves that clandestine weapons tests emit into the upper atmosphere, scientists announced yesterday.

Simple organic compounds detected by Curiosity on Mars

Mon, 03 Dec 2012 11:33:14 -0500

Too early to tell if findings are evidence of biological activity, scientists say

SAN FRANCISCO: The Curiosity rover has detected evidence of simple, chlorinated organic compounds in soil on Mars for the first time, project scientists announced Monday at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco. The scientists characterized the finding as very exciting, but they stressed that the results do not provide “definitive” evidence of past or present life on Mars.

Undressing Vesta

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 13:42:50 -0500

Researchers find surprising characteristics of the asteroid

Since last July, NASA’s Dawn spacecraft has been orbiting the asteroid Vesta and sending back images and other data to the delight and amazement of researchers, who presented their latest results at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in San Francisco, Calif., last December.

AGU: Aloha, magma! Geothermal engineers drill into surprising lava

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

Aerial view of channelized lava flow from Pu'u O'o in 1983. Photo is by J.D. Griggs, courtesy of U.S. Geological Survey

The location of Kilauea's Pu'u O'o crater activity in 2001. NASA Landsat

SAN FRANCISCO — While drilling deep into Earth, geothermal engineers struck geological gold, opening a never-before-seen window into a classic geologic process: how basalt magma becomes granite. The find, they announced at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union on Tuesday, could amount to the first magma observatory on Earth.

AGU: Climate science report questions likelihood of abrupt climate change

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

SAN FRANCISCO — A new U.S. Climate Change Science Program report states that abrupt climate change is unlikely to happen over the next century, scientists announced Tuesday at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union. However, the longer-term impacts of climate change could still be severe.

Blogging on EARTH: "Climategate" scientist tells his side

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

SAN FRANCISCO: In November, hackers broke into the e-mail server of the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit and stole thousands of e-mails dating back to 1996 written by and to climate scientists. The e-mails, which were then leaked to the public, contained the typical stuff of science (and of e-mails, for that matter): amid discussions of data and theory, there was debate, confusion, flippancy, dark humor and questioning.

Blogging on Earth: Driveway sealants add PAHs to environment

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

Pavement dust with coal-tar-based sealant has PAH concentrations hundreds to thousands of times higher than dust from pavement with no sealant or asphalt-based sealant. USGS

Winter is hard on asphalt: Water that seeps into tiny cracks freezes and expands, breaking the asphalt apart. That’s why homeowners and business owners across the U.S. use sealants to protect their driveways and parking lots.

Blogging on EARTH: Yellow submarine robot debuts at AGU meeting

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

The robotic submersible in flight mode. It will be tested in March in Lake Tahoe and will head to Antarctica late in 2011. DOER Marine

The submersible ROV looks a lot like a big yellow cigar; it opens up once beneath the ice. DOER Marine

Geologist Ross Powell stands with the DOER submarine ROV that will dive beneath Antarctica in coming years. Northern Illinois University

Geologist Reed Scherer with the submersible ROV at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco this week. Northern Illinois University

The rover is on display at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco this week. Northern Illinois University

McMurdo Station in Antarctica. Photograph by Steven Profaizer, National Science Foundation

It doesn’t look like a typical robot. About half a meter across and 9 meters long, a new, super-high-tech submarine ROV, unveiled Tuesday in San Francisco at the American Geophysical Union’s annual meeting, strongly resembles … well, a big yellow cigar.

Science and soccer: They're both child's play

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

Claire studies water samples in the UCSC laboratory. Jim Metzner

Collecting runoff samples from a turf field... 2009 by Deanna Hodgin

...and from a grass field. 2009 by Deanna Hodgin

It’s late in the afternoon, and by now, 9-year-old Claire Dworsky has already answered questions like mine many times over. But, when I approach the crowd of people standing by her poster at the American Geophysical Union’s (AGU) annual meeting in San Francisco, Calif., she jumps up from her chair and politely gives me her full attention. I ask her to explain her project, and she launches into her explanation, never turning to look at the poster behind her for backup, or at the adults nearby who are watching her with pride. Dressed in a red soccer uniform and fidgeting just a bit — it has been a long day — she outlines why she chose this project, which examines the water quality of artificial turf and natural grass soccer fields.