Earth

DURHAM, N.C. -- Political advocates who support action on climate change have long sought "the perfect message" for swaying skeptics. If the issue can be framed correctly, they believe, the battle can be won.

A new Duke University study suggests it may be more complicated than that.

• Climate change and extreme weather - including unusually wet summers in the UK - linked to high pressure weather systems over Greenland
• Study finds increase in atmospheric high pressure systems since 1980s throughout all seasons
• High pressure weather systems drag unusually warm air over Greenland's Ice Sheet

Greenland is one of the fastest-warming regions of the world, according to climate change experts at the University of Sheffield.

Feb. 27, 2010, is a date that most Chileans will probably never forget. On that day, the sixth strongest earthquake in recorded history--packing a force greater than the most powerful thermonuclear device ever tested--occurred off the country's central coast. Now, thanks to a newly available set of data collected in the aftermath of the disaster, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is providing Chile and other quake-prone areas worldwide with a powerful tool toward becoming more resilient to future seismic events.

In the world of chemistry, one minus one almost always equals zero.

But new research from Northwestern University and the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in France shows that is not always the case. And the discovery will change scientists' understanding of mirror-image molecules and their optical activity.

From a quarter to half of Earth's vegetated lands has shown significant greening over the last 35 years largely due to rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, according to a new study published in the journal Nature Climate Change on April 25.

VANCOUVER, Wash. - Drought could render the U.S. Northeast's mixed forests unsustainable after 2050 while Washington's Cascade Mountains may require tropical and subtropical forest species, according to researchers using a new type of mathematical model at Washington State University.

ANN ARBOR--A single U.S. shale oil field is responsible for much of the past decade's increase in global atmospheric levels of ethane, a gas that can damage air quality and impact climate, according to new study led by the University of Michigan.

The researchers found that the Bakken Formation, an oil and gas field in North Dakota and Montana, is emitting roughly 2 percent of the globe's ethane. That's about 250,000 tons per year.

MADISON, Wis. -- In 1442, 50 years before Columbus "sailed the ocean blue," Shinto priests in Japan began keeping records of the annual freeze dates of a nearby lake. Along a Finnish river, starting in 1693, local merchants recorded the date the ice broke up each spring. These observations are among the oldest inland water ice records in human history, and now they are contributing to modern understanding of climate change.

ATLANTA -- A minimally invasive screening for ulcerative colitis, a debilitating gastrointestinal tract disorder, using emerging infrared technology could be a rapid and cost-effective method for detecting disease that eliminates the need for biopsies and intrusive testing of the human body, according to researchers at Georgia State University.

If you've ever experienced the exceptionally powerful and reverberating sounds of a jet during takeoff, you likely won't be surprised that the noise produced by jet engines is ranked among the loudest of human-generated noises.

BINGHAMTON, NY - Women who lose their unfaithful mate to another woman actually win in the long run, according to new research.

TORONTO, April 26, 2016 - In 1442, Shinto priests in Japan began keeping records of the freeze dates of a nearby lake, while in 1693 Finnish merchants started recording breakup dates on a local river. Together they create the oldest inland water ice records in human history and mark the first inklings of climate change, says a new report published today out of York University and the University of Wisconsin.

WASHINGTON, April 26, 2016 -- In the age of selfies, it seems everyone wants to have a whiter, brighter smile. While one option to achieve this involves a trip to the dentist for a professional whitening, many people have turned to over-the-counter teeth-whitening treatments. How do these work, and are they safe? This week, Reactions looks at the chemistry of a whiter smile. Check it out here: https://youtu.be/_HqA4lCG2EU.

Scientists from Tomsk Polytechnic University and Rosatom have developed a technology to reprocess irradiated reactor graphite by evaporation. This technology allows making radioactive waste disposal safer and economically feasible.

Graphene, a sheet one atom thick made up of carbon atoms, has a huge number of qualities but lacks magnetic properties. Yet the hydrogen atom has the smallest magnetic moment. The magnetic moment is the magnitude that determines how much and in what direction a magnet will exert force. "In other words, we can all remember having held a magnet in our hands and seeing how it was capable of attracting or repelling another magnet at a certain distance, which was greater or smaller depending on its power. Well, what really determined this behaviour was the magnetic moment of our set of magnets.