Wed, May 6, 2020
Mount Erebus is the world's southern most active volcano and is one of only eight in the world that has a lava lake. The volcano exists on a rift where the continent of Antarctic is spreading allowing magma to rise to the surface. Steam from the volcano freezes near the rim creating ice fumeroles that host living bacteria.
Mon, Jan 11, 2021
PBS Terra visits the Bonneville Salt Flats with geologists who are working to determine why the salt is no being replenished there as in other salt flats around the world.
Thu, Mar 18, 2021
Foxes are canidaes, in the same family as dogs. But they differ a bit from dogs in being more independent or loners. A few scientists have worked on domesticating foxes and they domesticate well becoming as friendly to humans as dogs. But they retain certain behavioral differences.
Mon, Apr 19, 2021
Elephants have huge brains with more neurons that people. But how smart are they? Since they look at the world in a different way than people we'll have to be a little bit clever to figure that out.
Mon, Aug 16, 2021
Firenados are tornado sized vortexes of fire that form within wildfires. The heat of a wildfire causes air to rise into the sky pulling more air in at the surface. As the fire rises can begin spinning under the proper surface conditions creating a vortex of fire that draws even more air into the fire.
Thu, Sep 9, 2021
The Dust Bowl in the United States may have ended in the 1930s. But dust storms continue world wide claiming lives every year from car accidents involving blinded drives. And there's more than one way to create a dust storm. Here's what causes them.
Thu, Oct 7, 2021
Mount Saint Helens' 1980 eruption left a steep caldera that is largely shaded from the sun. Combined with heavy snowfall the result is a glacier that is growing fifteen meters deeper every year even though steam from volcanic vents is melting ice from below.
Thu, Nov 4, 2021
A large predator, the coyote, is thriving in American cities, even in the heart of their downtowns. While many think they are living off people and just passing through, researchers have found they are permanent residents that don't rely on people and thrive best by avoiding them and their vehicles.
Thu, Dec 23, 2021
The Florida Everglades contains thousands of tiny islands known as tree islands. They are essential habitat for wildlife and, historically, for people as well. But recent mismanagement of water flow in the Everglades has caused localized flooding eroding some seventy percent of the islands.
Wed, Jan 26, 2022
Climatologists studying the jet stream have seen it moving north over the past twenty years (as of 2022.) The cause is the warming arctic. The result is warmer weather in the southern latitudes resulting in dryer or wetter weather depending on location.
Tue, Feb 22, 2022
Coronal mass ejections from the Sun are known to produce geomagnetic storms that in turn create power surges here on Earth that damage electronic equipment. It was assumed that the more the sever the storm the more damage it would cause but recent (2022) research indicates the Earth's geography is a more important factor.