Phys.org May 26, 2021 For two weeks in June 2020, a massive dust plume from Saharan Africa crept westward across the Atlantic, blanketing the Caribbean and Gulf Coast states in the U.S. Researchers at the University of Kansas used satellite datasets to reconstruct the patterns that transported the dust from Africa to the Americas. According to the researchers the extreme trans-Atlantic dust event is associated with both enhanced dust emissions over western North Africa and atmospheric circulation extremes that favor long-range dust transport. An exceptionally strong African easterly jet and associated wave activities export African dust across the Atlantic toward […]
Tag Archives: Climate change
Number of people suffering extreme droughts will double
Science Daily January 11, 2021 Using ensemble hydrological simulations, an international team of researchers (USA – Michigan State University, Japan, Austria, Germany, UK, Greece, Switzerland, China, Belgium, the Netherlands) shows that climate change could reduce TWS (Terrestrial water storage ) in many regions, especially those in the Southern Hemisphere. Strong inter-ensemble agreement indicates high confidence in the projected changes that are driven primarily by climate forcing rather than land and water management activities. Declines in TWS translate to increases in future droughts. By the late twenty-first century, the global land area and population in extreme-to-exceptional TWS drought could more than […]
Smaller scale solutions needed for rapid progress towards emissions targets
Science Daily April 2, 2020 Of the 45 energy technologies deemed critical by the International Energy Agency for meeting global climate targets, 38 need to improve substantially in cost and performance while accelerating deployment over the next decades. An international team of researchers (Austria, UK, Portugal, Canada) focus on the appropriate scale of technological responses in the energy system on the specific needs of accelerated low-carbon transformation, synthesize evidence on energy end-use technologies in homes, transport, and industry, as well as electricity generation and energy supply and go beyond technical and economic considerations to include innovation, investment, deployment, social, and […]
Observing a molecule stretch and bend in real-time
Phys.org April 9, 2019 In 2016 an international team of researchers (Spain, Poland, USA – Kansas State University, Germany) achieved the required spatial and temporal resolution to take snapshots of molecular dynamics without missing any events. Now the group has observed the structural bending and stretching of the triatomic molecular compound carbon disulphide, CS2. They reported that the ultrafast modifications in the molecular structure are driven by changes in the electronic structure of the molecule. This effect is key for important triatomic molecules such as CS2, since it can determine specific chemical reactions in the Earth’s atmosphere that could, for […]