Planet Earth, features and articles | Educational Science

Aug 31, 2012

Dramatic Video Apparently Shows Lightning Striking an SUV

A video posted to YouTube on Sept. 17 shows a few cars cruising slowly down a rainy highway in Russia before a sudden blinding flash gives way to a streak of lightning zapping the roof of an SUV. Afterward, the SUV gradually comes to a stop in a way that...

Aug 31, 2012

Childhood Interests Grow Into A Cherished Career

If Cheryl Wilga's laboratory had an official soundtrack, it might be the notorious thump … thump … thump from the soundtrack of the movie Jaws. That's because she and her research team study anatomical features and behaviors that impact the individual survival of fish — including the feeding behaviors of...

Aug 31, 2012

Key US East Coast Weather Satellite GOES-13 Fails

A major weather satellite monitoring the U.S. East Coast has shut down, prompting officials to activate a spare satellite to take its place. The GOES-13 satellite failed after days of erratic behavior, officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration officials said Monday (Sept. 24). The replacement, GOES-14, has already...

Jul 31, 2012

Gallery: The World's Weirdest Balancing Rocks

Balancing rock (Image credit: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 | Penny Mayes)This balancing rock formation is one of the Brimham rocks, located on Brimham Moor in North Yorkshire, England. Made of millstone grit, it was carved over time through water and wind erosion. The bottom layer eroded fastest. Balancing column (Image...

Jul 31, 2012

Fracking Earthquakes: Injection Practice Linked to Scores of Tremors

Earthquakes triggered by fluids injected deep underground, such as during the controversial practice of fracking, may be more common than previously thought, a new study suggests. Fluid injections into Earth are not uncommon. For instance, in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, water, sand and other materials are injected under high pressure...

Jul 31, 2012

How Strange Twinned Rainbows Form

Double rainbows had their fifteen minutes of fame on the Internet. Now get ready for their even more mysterious cousins: twinned rainbows. New research has suggested an explanation for these exotic shows of color. Rainbows are known to form when sunlight interacts with tiny water drops in the atmosphere. As...

Jul 31, 2012

Best Earth Images of the Week - Aug. 17, 2012

Aerial eruption (Image credit: NASA)On Aug. 15, NASA's Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite caught a crystal-clear image of a small ash plume emanating from a tiny volcanic Indonesian island. The volcano, called Batu Tara, is located on the island of Pulau Komba, and has been experiencing frequent, mild eruptions since mid-2006,...

Jul 31, 2012

Quakes Beneath Antarctic Glacier Linked to Ocean Tides

Thousands of earthquakes occurring in rapid succession in less than a year under an Antarctic glacier may have been linked to ocean tides, new research suggests. Scientists investigated seismic activity under David Glacier, a large glacier in East Antarctica about 270 square miles (700 square kilometers) in size. The glacier...

Jul 31, 2012

Beyond Wind & Rain: Isaac Could Stir Up Oil

As Tropical Storm Isaac roars over Louisiana and elsewhere on the Gulf Coast, it threatens to disrupt a fragile environment that's still recovering from BP's Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the summer of 2010. By disturbing the sediments in which the spilled oil is buried, near the beach and deeper...

Jun 30, 2012

Best Earth Images of the Month June 2012

Nap time (Image credit: Tammy Spratt, San Diego Zoo Safari Park)The San Diego Zoo Safari Park's two Sumatran tiger cubs took a catnap after a morning spent exploring their exhibit. Conrad claimed the top spot, while brother Thomas chose to be near, rather than on their mother, Delta. The 3-month-old...

Jun 30, 2012

What's Behind The Record Heat?

Heat is beating records around the country: the first five months of 2012 have been the hottest on record in the contiguous United States. And that's not including June, when 164 all-time high temperature records were tied or broken around the country, according to government records. That's unusual, since the...

Jun 30, 2012

9% of Today's Warming Caused By Preindustrial People

Humans started causing climate change long before the Industrial Revolution and the beginning of the fossil fuel era. A new study shows that the echoes of the earliest human-caused carbon emissions are still present in our atmosphere. In fact, preindustrial carbon emissions, caused by deforestation as the world's population grew,...

Jun 30, 2012

Drought Reaches Record 56% of Continental US

The United States is parched, with more than half of the land area in the lower 48 states experiencing moderate to extreme drought, according to a report released today (July 5). Just under 56 percent of the contiguous United States is in drought conditions, the most extensive area in the...

Jun 30, 2012

Global Warming Shrinking Plant Leaves

Warming temperatures are turning a native Australian shrub into a mini version of itself, revealing the effect climate change is already having on the globe. Researchers from the University of Adelaide examined specimens of narrow-leaf hopbush (Dodonaea viscosa, subspecies angustissima), a woody shrub with papery red seed capsules that were...

Jun 30, 2012

US Heat Wave: First Half of Year Hottest on Record

June weather records are in, and the nation's unprecedented warm spell continues, making this the warmest first half of the year and the warmest 12-month period since record-keeping began for the continental U.S. in 1895. Last month, like many before it, had heat that was above average, and high temperatures...