Phy.org April 29, 2021 Lightning increases the atmosphere’s ability to cleanse itself by producing nitric oxide (NO), leading to atmospheric chemistry that forms ozone (O3) and the atmosphere’s primary oxidant, the hydroxyl radical (OH). A team of researchers (Pennsylvania State University, Texas Tech University, NOAA, University of Oklahoma, University of Maryland, University of Alaska, University of Colorado) analyzed data from their 2012 airborne study of deep convection and chemistry which showed that lightning also directly generates the oxidants OH and the hydroperoxyl radical (HO2). Extreme amounts of OH and HO2 were discovered and linked to visible flashes occurring in front […]
Tag Archives: Climatology
Ocean bacteria release carbon into the atmosphere
Science Daily April 12, 2021 A team of researchers in the US (University of Minnesota Twin-Cities, Boston University, Harvard University) discovered that deep-sea bacteria dissolve carbon-containing rocks, releasing excess carbon into the ocean and atmosphere. They studied sulfur-oxidizing bacteria — a group of microbes that use sulfur as an energy source — in methane seeps on the ocean floor. The seeps contain collections of limestone that trap large amounts of carbon. The sulfur-oxidizing microbes live on top of these rocks, in the process of oxidizing sulfur, the bacteria create an acidic reaction that dissolves the rocks. This releases the carbon […]
Scientists discover three liquid phases in aerosol particles
Phys.org April 12, 2021 Aerosol particles fill the atmosphere and play a critical role in air quality. These particles contribute to poor air quality and absorb and reflect solar radiation, affecting the climate system. An international team of researchers (Canada, USA – UC Irvine, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Harvard University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Germany) used optical and fluorescence microscopy, to present images that showed the coexistence of two noncrystalline phases for real-world samples as well as for laboratory-generated samples under simulated atmospheric conditions. The results revealed that atmospheric particles can undergo liquid–liquid phase separations. The study focused on particles […]
Reflecting sunlight could cool the Earth’s ecosystem
Science Daily April 7, 2021 Solar radiation modification (SRM) is one potential approach to partially counteract anthropogenic warming by reflecting a small proportion of the incoming solar radiation to increase Earth’s albedo. An international team of researchers (USA – Michigan State University, Stony Brook University, UC Riverside, City University of New York, industry, UT Rio Grande Valley, University of Minnesota, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, University of Tennessee, University of Minnesota, Rutgers University, Cornell University, Canada, Hong Kong) studied the stratospheric aerosol intervention (SAI), a well-studied and relatively feasible SRM scheme that is likely to have a large impact on Earth’s […]
Global Warming Is ‘Fundamentally’ Changing The Structure of Our World’s Oceans
Science Alert March 25, 2021 An international team of researchers (Australia, UK, Germany, France, USA – Carnegie Mellon University) used global temperature and salinity observations obtained between 1970 and 2018 with a focus on the summer months. They found that the barrier layer separating the ocean surface and the deep layers had strengthened world-wide at a much larger rate than previously thought and contrary to their expectations, winds strengthened by climate change had also acted to deepen the ocean surface layer by five to 10 metres per decade over the last half century. The oceans play a crucial role in […]
Microbes fueled by wind-blown mineral dust melt the Greenland ice sheet
Science Daily January 25, 2021 Melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet is a leading cause of land-ice mass loss and cryosphere-attributed sea level rise. Blooms of pigmented glacier ice algae lower ice albedo and accelerate surface melting in the ice sheet’s southwest sector. Although glacier ice algae cause up to 13% of the surface melting in this region, the controls on bloom development remain poorly understood. An international team of researchers (US, Canada, Germany, Denmark) has shown a direct link between mineral phosphorus in surface ice and glacier ice algae biomass through the quantification of solid and fluid phase phosphorus […]
Engineering a Way Out of Climate Change: Genetically Modified Organisms Could be the Key
Technology.org November 17, 2020 An international team of researchers (USA – Boston University, UC Santa Barbara, industry, DOE, UC Berkeley, Harvard Medical School, Arizona State University, University of Washington, Woods Hole, Colorado State University, MIT, Cornell University, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Israel) has identified the possible ways in which synthetic and systems biology (SSB) could be used to reduce greenhouse gas. According to the researchers the range of possibilities include: Engineer plants to reduce atmospheric CO2, Identify genes that control the distribution of Biomass, Genetically modify the Root-to-Shoot ratio of Plants, Engineer plants to increase productivity, Engineer plants to Self-Fertilize, […]
New tractor beam has potential to tame lightning
Phys.org November 11, 2020 Numerous experiments utilizing powerful pulsed lasers with peak-intensity above air photoionization and photo-dissociation have demonstrated excitation and confinement of plasma tracks in the wakes of laser field. An international team of researchers (Australia, USA – UCLA) developed and demonstrated an efficient approach for triggering, trapping, and guiding electrical discharges in air. It is based on the use of a low-power continuous-wave vortex beam that traps and transports light-absorbing particles in mid-air. They found a 30% decrease in discharge threshold mediated by optically trapped graphene microparticles with the use of a laser beam of a few hundred […]
Brown carbon ‘tarballs’ detected in Himalayan atmosphere
Science Daily November 4, 2020 Primary brown carbon (BrC) co-emitted with black carbon from biomass burning is an important light-absorbing carbonaceous aerosol. An international team of researchers (China, USA – Georgia Institute of Technology, UK, Hungary) detected light-absorbing tarballs at microscopic scale collected on the northern slope of the Himalayas. About 28% of thousands of individual particles were tarballs. Air mass trajectories, satellite detection, and Weather Research and Forecasting model coupled to Chemistry (WRF-Chem) simulations all indicated that these tarballs were emitted from biomass burning in the Indo-Gangetic Plain. According to the researchers climate model simulation shows a significant heating […]
Atmospheric dust levels are rising in the Great Plains
Science Daily October 13, 2020 In the 1920s Midwestern farmers had converted vast tracts of grassland into farmland using mechanical plows. When the crops failed in the drought the open areas of land that used to be covered by grass, which held soil tightly in place, were now bare dirt, vulnerable to wind erosion. In a study covering years from 1988 to 2018 a team of researchers in the US (University of Utah, University of Colorado) found that atmospheric dust levels are rising across the Great Plains at a rate of up to 5% per year. The trend of rising […]