As well as the two of us, there are many other earth, ocean and space scientists using Twitter these days: The AGU have more than 300 on their list. Listed below are the most interesting things we came across last week.
Blogs in motion
- Check out two new geoblogs: @leilageologist will be writing on Precambrian paleontology, and @Polar_Gal will (unsurprisingly) be sharing polar science with the world.
- Thanks to the efforts of @anatotitan, the Boneyard Blog Carnival is back! Check out Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs for the details.
- Presenting the firehose of all bloggy firehoses: http://scienceblogging.org. It features the all-geo feed, and they are welcoming feedback on how to improve it.
Volcanoes
- Seismic activity at Eyjafjallajokul ‘petering out’. Eruption not over, but the main risk is now mud flows.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jh7lQ-qBxQMPzPd3Iap7_s3YDBfQD9HKLP6O0 - Great photo-essay of recent lava flows on Hawaii, with the pictures of lava reaching ocean being particularly epic.
http://hawaiianlavadaily.blogspot.com/2010/08/month-in-pictures-of-lava-flow.html
- Time-lapse footage of collapse of a recently formed lava bench/delta on Hawaii.
http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/gallery/kilauea/volcanomovies/movies/East%20Lae%60apuki%20collapse%20-%20Nov%2028,%202005-small.mov
http://hawaiianlavadaily.blogspot.com/2010/08/bench-collapse-movie-clips-for-non.html - Finally had time to read epic guest post at Eruptions: Mt Etna’s complex geodynamic setting & eruptive history
http://scienceblogs.com/eruptions/2010/08/mount_etna_-_brief_anatomy_of.php
(Also see Part 2 and Part 3 in the series.) - Very enjoyable post from http://geotripper.blogspot.com/2010/08/dispatches-from-road-exploring-koolau.html
- Live underwater video feed from top of an active underwater volcano 400 km west of Newport, OR
http://interactiveoceans.washington.edu/story/Live+Video
(via @earthinstitute) - Rwanda Taps Volcanic “Exploding Lake” Kivu for Power. They are using the methane, and putting carbon dioxide and water back in the lake.
http://inhabitat.com/2010/08/16/rwanda-taps-volcano-power-beneath-exploding-lake/
(via @lisduarte, @inhabitat)
Earthquakes & Tectonics
- Slow-slip events beneath Cascadia help seismologists to map the extent of the locked subduction thrust (capable of generating M 9.0 earthquakes) but may also stress it and make it more likely to rupture.
http://news.discovery.com/earth/seattles-ongoing-silent-quake-lends-clues-to-the-big-one.html - A nice animated map of earthquakes in Iceland associated with eruption of Eyjafjallajokul.
http://flowingdata.com/2010/08/16/animated-map-of-earthquakes-in-iceland/
(via @flowingdata) - A note on the new San Andreas Fault study that suggests it ruptures with a <100 yr recurrence interval, by one of the co-authors [with link to paper].
https://arrowsmith.blog.asu.edu/2010/08/20/century-long-average-time-intervals-between-earthquake-ruptures-of-the-san-andreas-fault-in-the-carrizo-plain-california - Demonstrating Earthquake Effects Using Jell-O and Rice Crispy Treats [then feed students the debris?]
http://jazinator.blogspot.com/2010/08/demonstrating-earthquake-effects-using.html
(by @Jazinator)
Fossils
- Whatever Happened to Seismosaurus? A tale of reclassification w/ echos of Torosaurus/Tricerotops, but in this case it occurred without the media frenzy.
http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/dinosaur/2010/08/17/whatever-happened-to-seismosaurus/ - Following the putative Cryogenian sponge fossils announced in Nature, news that an even older Cryogenian sponge fossil discovery is having trouble getting published?
http://suvratk.blogspot.com/2010/08/is-my-fossil-not-spongeworthy.html
(Paleo)climate
- A nearly ice-free Northwest Passage:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=45333
(via @Polar_Gal, @NASAGoddard, @NASA_EO)
- A sobering point: like the amp in ‘Spinal Tap’ going to 11, climate change not just loading dice but amplifying extremes:
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/18/climate-extremes-beyond-loaded-dice/
(via @Revkin) - Get ready for Dust Bowl 2.0 in Southwest, says Richard Seager of Columbia’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in :
http://www.grist.org/article/2010-08-12-ucs-article-drought-tracker/
(via @westcenter, @grist) - Tipping point for Greenland ice sheet: 2-7 C. And scientists are having to pay their own airfares to monitor it.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/10/greenland-ice-sheet-tipping-point - A nice explanation of why Antarctic sea ice is growing in a warmer world -for now.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/08/100816-global-warming-antarctica-sea-ice-paradox-science-environment/
(via @stevesilberman)
Water
- The most impressive Pakistan flooding images yet
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=45302
(via @NASA_EO)
Donate to help Pakistani flood victims! See InterAction’s list of aid groups - Drowning Today, Parched Tomorrow – Pakistan needs more water supply & storage.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/16/opinion/16solomon.html
(via @thirstygecko, @columbiawater) - Monsoon floods Pakistan, but no rain to be found in drought stricken West Bengal
http://sify.com/news/11-districts-drought-hit-no-food-crisis-west-bengal-news-national-kiquEeiejbg.html - Human Damaged Ecosystems & Bad Land Management Amplify Killer Floods
http://topicfire.com/share/Damaged-Ecosystems-Amplify-Killer-Floods-15232550.html
(via @geographile, @InvasiveNotes, @BreakingScience) - Great profile of MIT’s Charles Harvey and the complex problem of arsenic in Bangladesh’s groundwater
http://www.miller-mccune.com/science/charles-harvey-water-detective-20153/
(via @WaterWired) - New interactive map of 140 big dams planned for the Amazon
http://www.internationalrivers.org/en/2010-8-17/new-online-map-plots-140-large-dams-planned-amazon
(via @WaterWired, @rivrchik, @IntlRivers) - check out @NatGeoSociety‘s Water Footprint Calculator. In the US, most water consumption is for food production.
http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/freshwater/water-footprint-calculator/
(via @rivrchik, @worldresources)
Environmental
- Report finds ~80 percent of the spilled oil is still in the Gulf of Mexico, in contrast to US govt claims.
http://news.discovery.com/earth/report-nearly-80-percent-of-spilled-oil-still-threatens-gulf.html
(via @Discovery_Earth)
Meanwhile, Deep Sea News reports definitive evidence of a deepwater oil plume.
http://deepseanews.com/2010/08/9628/ - Scottish scientists develop whisky biofuel. From the by-products, thank goodness! Provides 30% more power than ethanol biofuel.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/17/whisky-biobuel-scotland - Interesting: broadly distributed offshore wind turbine network can largely solve intermittency problems
http://www.naturalnews.com/029476_wind_turbines_power.html
(via @argillic) - Europe’s Brisk Energy Transition: 18.4% of total power generation now from renewables. Almost encouraging…
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/20/europes-brisk-energy-transition/
(via @nytimesscience) - Appeals court decision: mud from logging roads is pollution under the Clean Water Act. Are roads point sources that require a permit?
http://www.peninsuladailynews.com/article/20100817/NEWS/100819980/appeals-court-decision-8212-mud-from-logging-roads-is-pollution
(via @kjmcguire)
Planets
- 10s of 1000s of mud volcanoes found on Mars? Prob been inactive for a couple of billion years, but still interesting
http://www.physorg.com/news201452152.html
General Geology
- Callan Bentley is back in the geoblogosphere with a bang: as well as a lovely Friday fold (the first in a new weekly series), he also gives us the gorgeous deformed Purgatory congolomerate:
http://mountainbeltway.wordpress.com/2010/08/20/friday-fold-samaria-gorge-crete/
http://mountainbeltway.wordpress.com/2010/08/20/purgatory-conglomerate/ - Fantastic research blogging at Hindered Settling on the complexity of sinuous channel deposits in three dimensions
http://zsylvester.blogspot.com/2010/08/complexity-of-sinuous-channel-deposits.html - Nice article on the tricky business of reconstructing Earth’s redox / oxygen history: has the Great Oxygenation Event been overstated?
http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/21010.aspx
(via @ComplexLifeNAI) - Fascinating: using prehistoric obsidian tools to trace old trade and migration routes.
https://inlportal.inl.gov/portal/server.pt?open=514&objID=1269&mode=2&featurestory=DA_164833 - Video of frazil ice at Yosemite. Makes for very dynamic river behaviour. Amazing.
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/05/24/frazil-ice-fascinati.html
(via @drjerque) - The hidden geological history of WWI: the military advantage of holding chalk highlands in N France
http://woostergeologists.scotblogs.wooster.edu/2010/08/15/the-military-advantage-of-holding-the-upper-cretaceous-chalk-highlands/ - @morphosaurus gets no response to her letter to the Governor of Wyoming over the potential sale of parts of Grand Teton National Park. Perhaps we should all send a letter to Congress & Interior Secretary Salazar?
http://www.stagesofsuccession.com/2010/08/disappointment-peak.html
Interesting Miscellaney
- In the dust-up between Ray ‘simulate the brain in 20 years’ Kurzweil and anyone who knows anything about biology, this comparison between his rhetoric and that of geoengineering advocates is rather telling.
http://fistfulofscience.com/2010/08/17/what-ray-kurzweil-and-geoengineering-have-in-common/
(via @tvjrennie, @jrminkel) - An imaginative visualisation tool – BBC Dimensions, lets you map notable events, thing and places onto your locale. For example, the Pakistan Floods are pretty much the length of the Mississippi.
http://howbigreally.com/
(via @infobeautiful) - Some interesting musings on the link between basic research and useful technology at Shatsky Blog (complete with gratuitous Titanic reference)
http://lifeonshatsky.blogspot.com/2010/08/saving-1522-lives-on-titanic-with.html
(via @jackiefloyd)
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