June 8, 2015
Comment: The arrival of the energy future
Transformations of resources into products and movements of products through the economic system require energy. Throughout the 20th century, …
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Geology
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1236 articles · Page 37 of 52
June 8, 2015
Down to Earth With: Geophysicist Peter Molnar
As a graduate student in geophysics at Columbia University in the late 1960s, Peter Molnar — who had studied physics as an undergraduate — …
June 8, 2015
Getting there and getting around the Catskill Mountain Front
We began our journey near fabled Woodstock, N.Y., which is best known for the 1969 outdoor concert that did not actually occur there. Woodstock, …
June 8, 2015
Travels in Geology: Hiking the Catskill Mountain Front
The dramatic easternmost edge of upstate New York’s Catskill Mountains goes by several names. The Algonquin called it the Wall of Manitou — …
June 8, 2015
Geoheritage: Preserving Earth's legacy
A few years ago, we toured southern China’s world-class karst topography. Steering our rusty, gearless bikes along the bumpy, dirt road required …
June 8, 2015
Tools of the trade
Until a few decades ago, illustrators most often plied their trade with pencil and paper, ink, watercolors, or maybe airbrushed paints. While …
June 7, 2015
Studies re-examine how major copper deposits form
Every year, the world consumes about 20 million tons of copper primarily for construction materials like electrical wiring and water pipes. Most …
June 7, 2015
Science Illustrators: Making the invisible visible
Perched on a ledge overlooking a lush forested valley, a creature stands on a pile of leaves, craning its neck to pluck a plump insect off a …
June 1, 2015
Ice (Re) Cap: June 2015
From Antarctica to the Arctic; from polar caps, permafrost and glaciers to ocean-rafted sea ice; and from burly bears to cold-loving microbes, …
June 1, 2015
Colonial mining left its mark in Andean ice cores
When Spanish Conquistadors arrived in the Andes Mountains of Peru and Bolivia, they found a landscape rich in silver. Now, scientists have found …
June 1, 2015
Monkeys in the New World earlier than thought
Monkeys originated in Africa, but how and when they first appeared in Central and South America has long been something of a mystery. Now, a new …
June 1, 2015
Getting to the bottom of a tectonic plate
Earth’s rigid, brittle lithosphere is broken into seven major plates, as well as many minor plates, which ride along atop a ductile layer of the …
May 29, 2015
Counting 'tree' rings in fish skulls provides climate clues
Most fish have little structures in their skulls that record growth patterns — periods of feast and famine — just like tree rings. Now, …
May 28, 2015
California's big trees dying of thirst
From the days of John Muir’s treks through the sylvan valleys and granite peaks of the Sierra Nevada, California’s majestic forests have …
May 26, 2015
Geomedia: On the web: Personalizing drought data with digital tools
With drought, people feel the heat while it’s happening, but understanding how current droughts fit into past trends — and what they mean for the …
May 22, 2015
Megafloods mostly shaped Icelandic canyon landscape
In the 1920s, geologist J Harlen Bretz proposed that cataclysmic glacial megafloods had dramatically transformed the landscape of the …
May 14, 2015
Giant bolide hit South Africa 2.5 billion years ago
Some of the oldest scraps of continental crust on Earth cling to the southern tip of Africa and the western edge of Australia. In both places, …
May 14, 2015
Did volcanism drive Earth into global glaciation?
Between about 720 million and 635 million years ago, Earth suffered two big chills. During these “Snowball Earth” episodes, geologists think the …
May 14, 2015
Iraq's biggest dam on unsure footing
Much of Iraq’s national power grid, as well as its irrigation and municipal water supplies, depend on Mosul Dam, a large earthen structure on the …
May 12, 2015
Earth's most abundant mineral finally gets a name
An elusive, high-density form of magnesium iron silicate, long known colloquially as “silicate perovskite,” now officially bears the name …
May 12, 2015
Pre-settlement erosion rates illuminated
Humans are one of the most powerful erosive agents on Earth, moving copious amounts of sediment to and fro, mainly through agriculture and …
May 8, 2015
Energy Notes: November 2013-2014
U.S. Oil & Petroleum Imports (million of barrels per day) Oil and petroleum imports data are preliminary numbers taken from the American …
May 8, 2015
Mineral Resource of the Month: Iron oxide pigments
Arnold O. Tanner, a mineral commodity specialist for the U.S. Geological Survey, compiled the following information on iron oxide pigments. Iron …
May 8, 2015
Benchmarks: June 1,1840: Setting out for the Copper Country
On the morning of June 1, 1840, Michigan’s first state geologist, Douglass Houghton, stepped onto a small barge about to set sail on Lake …