The volcano consists of inter–connected conduits, sills, and dikes that allow magma to rise from deep within the Earth.
Months of volcanic restlessness preceded the eruptions this spring of Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull, providing insight into what roused it from centuries of slumber.
Continue reading… “Reawakening of Icelandic Volcano!!!”
Earthquakes increase when the moon is closer to Earth and when there is a full Moon.
Seismologists at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre have found that the earthquake counts go up steadily as the moon comes closer to the Earth (perigee) and also when it is Full Moon.
Continue reading… “Earthquakes Increase as the Moon Comes Closer to Earth”
Historic Charleston earthquake of 1886.
The risk of earthquakes in the U.S. Midwest may be more widespread than geologists have believed, but a “big one” may be less likely at Missouri’s New Madrid fault, researchers said.
The Feb. 27 magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile may have shortened the length of each Earth day.
Continue reading… “Chilean Quake May Have Shortened Earth Days”
Construction at the Atakoy Lisesi school. Istanbul has a program to secure its schools against earthquakes.
As Mustafa Erdik, the director of an earthquake engineering institute in Istanbul, surveys the streets of this sprawling mega-city, he says he sometimes feels like a doctor scanning a crowded hospital ward.
It is not so much the city’s modern core, where two sleek Trump Towers and a huge airport terminal were built to withstand a major earthquake that is considered all but inevitable in the next few decades. Nor does Dr. Erdik agonize over Istanbul’s ancient monuments, whose yards-thick walls have largely withstood more than a dozen potent seismic blows over the past two millenniums.
Continue reading… “Mega-Cities in Earthquake Zones Await Disaster”
When Earth was young, it exhaled the atmosphere. During a period of intense volcanic activity, lava carried light elements from the planet’s molten interior and released them into the sky. However, some light elements got trapped inside the planet. In the journal Nature, a Rice University-based team of scientists is offering a new answer to a longstanding mystery: What caused Earth to hold its last breath?
Continue reading… “Upside-Down Answer for Deep Mystery: What Caused Earth to Hold Its Last Breath?”
In 2005, a gigantic, 35-mile-long rift broke open the desert ground in Ethiopia. At the time, some geologists believed the rift was the beginning of a new ocean as two parts of the African continent pulled apart, but the claim was controversial.
Continue reading… “African Desert Rift Confirmed As New Ocean In The Making”
New species are not just discovered in exotic locales—even places as urban as California still yield discoveries of new plants and animals. Academy scientists recently named a new species of chimaera, an ancient and bizarre group of fishes distantly related to sharks, from the coast of Southern California and Baja California, Mexico. Continue reading… “Ancient And Bizarre Fish Discovered: New Species Of Ghostshark From California And Baja California”
Research at the University of Liverpool has shown it is possible to develop an ‘invisibility cloak’ to protect buildings from earthquakes.
Continue reading… “‘Invisibility Cloak’ Could Protect Against Earthquakes”
In addition to providing fundamental insights into the early evolution of the estrogen receptor, research by a team at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine may lead to a contraceptive for female lampreys – a jawless fish considered an invasive pest species in the Great Lakes region of the United States. This could prove important to the Great Lakes region, where lampreys aggressively consume trout, salmon, sturgeon and other game fish.
Continue reading… “Evolution Of A Contraceptive For Invasive Sea Lamprey”
University of Michigan aquatic ecologist Donald Scavia and his colleagues say this year’s Gulf of Mexico “dead zone” could be one of the largest on record, continuing a decades-long trend that threatens the health of a half-billion-dollar fishery.
Continue reading… “Large 2009 Gulf Of Mexico ‘Dead Zone’ Predicted”
By using a super-computer to virtually squeeze and heat iron-bearing minerals under conditions that would have existed when the Earth crystallized from an ocean of magma to its solid form 4.5 billion years ago, two UC Davis geochemists have produced the first picture of how different isotopes of iron were initially distributed in the solid Earth.
Continue reading… “Super-computer Provides First Glimpse Of Earth’s Early Magma Interior”