Planet Earth, features and articles | Educational Science

Sep 30, 2006

Human Activity Linked to Antarctic Ice Shelf Collapse

Human-caused global warming was responsible for the collapse of an Antarctic ice shelf in 2002, scientists said today. Changing weather patterns, a consequence of global warming, has caused stronger westerly winds to blow warm air from the middle latitudes to the Antarctic Peninsula. These winds are responsible for the summer...

Sep 30, 2006

World's 10 Most Polluted Places

Areas that researchers have declared the most polluted in the world are typically little known even in their own countries. Yet they in total afflict more than 10 million people, experts reported today. The kinds of pollution in these areas not only lead to cancers, birth defects, mental retardation and...

Sep 30, 2006

Ozone Hole Breaks Record

During its seasonal peak, the ozone hole set a record this year, scientists reported today. The ozone hole, which covers much of Antarctica, is thought to be caused by human-produced compounds which release chlorine and bromine. Chemical reactions high in the atmosphere cause these gases to destroy ozone. The presence...

Sep 30, 2006

Rising Seas and Stronger Storms Threaten New York City

Global warming could substantially raise sea levels around New York City over the next century and put the Big Apple at greater risk of being flooded by hurricane waves, a new computer model predicts. Sea level around the city could jump 15 to 19 inches by 2050 and by more...

Sep 30, 2006

The World's Worst Thunderstorms

A new global satellite survey of thunderstorm activity has helped meteorologists pinpoint exactly where Earth’s hotspots for intense thunderstorms are: the American Midwest, Argentina , and some semi-arid regions like the edges of the Sahara desert. The new study, which appeared in the August issue of the Bulletin of the...

Aug 31, 2006

Tiny Island Was Violent Microcosm of World Strife

A tiny island in the middle of nowhere is like a world in miniature, a new study finds. Rapa island lies isolated in the South Pacific, halfway between South America and New Zealand. Initially cooperative, its first settlers turned to violence when faced with the same pressures of environment and...

Aug 31, 2006

Town Let's Nature Deal with Nudity

BRATTLEBORO, Vt. (AP) -- Mother Nature, not an ordinance, will draw the covers over public nudity in Brattleboro. The town's Select Board decided Tuesday to take no action on an anti-nudity ordinance that was introduced in response to a clothing-optional movement launched by local teenagers this summer. Winter is coming....

Aug 31, 2006

Study: Earth and Space Weather Connected

Space weather in the upper reaches of the atmosphere is affected by weather conditions down here on Earth, a new study suggests. Using a combination of satellite imagery and computer simulations, researchers found that tides of air created by intense thunderstorms over South America, Africa and Southeast Asia are altering...

Aug 31, 2006

Tenacious Neanderthals Held Out in Pockets

Neanderthals might have held out in isolated refuges for thousands of years longer than previously thought, scientists reported today. Their survival at what seems to have been their last refuge in Gibraltar for far longer after the arrival of modern humans than once believed suggests our ancestors may not have...

Aug 31, 2006

Global Warming Takes a Break

Despite the long term warming trend seen around the globe, the oceans have cooled in the last three years, scientists announced today. The temperature drop, a small fraction of the total warming seen in the last 48 years, suggests that global warming trends can sometimes take little dips. In the...

Aug 31, 2006

Study: Global Warming Near Critical Level

Global temperatures are dangerously close to the highest ever estimated to have occurred in the past million years, scientists reported today. In a study that analyzed temperatures around the globe, researchers found that Earth has been warming rapidly, nearly 0.36 degrees Fahrenheit (0.2 degrees Celsius) in the last 30 years...

Jul 31, 2006

Weather Official: 'Alarming Increase' in Lightning Deaths

Lightning killed at least 14 people in the United States during the second half of July, a pace twice as deadly as in a typical year for the same two weeks. In the past two weeks, we've seen an alarming increase in the number of lightning deaths in this country,...

Jul 31, 2006

Antarctic Snow Constant for 50 Years

Contrary to expectations, there has been no increase in precipitation over Antarctica in the past half-century. Computer models assessing global climate change call for an increase in Antarctic precipitation as atmospheric temperatures rise. But the most precise record of Antarctic snowfall ever generated shows no change. But it's unclear what...

Jul 31, 2006

How Flowers Know Spring Has Sprung

A 10-year-old, 5-foot tall tropical corpse plant in Brooklyn flowered for the first time last week, emitting its powerful stench for three days. Luckily for Dutch tulip farmers, garden club members, and floral enthusiasts, many flowers in temperate regions of the world bloom each spring—and smell much sweeter. Flowering plants...

Jul 31, 2006

Americans Warm to Reality of Climate Change

A poll of more than 1,000 likely voters in the United States released this week showed that in the last two years Americans have become more convinced that global warming is happening. An increasing number also believe there is a link between the increase in temperature and severity of weather...