Researchers Model Differences in East Coast Sea Level Rise

For years, scientists have been warning of a so-called “hot spot” of accelerated sea-level rise along the northeastern U.S. coast. But accurately modeling this acceleration as well as variations in sea-level rise from one region to another has proven challenging.

Now an upcoming paper in Geophysical Research Letters offers the first comprehensive model for understanding differences in sea level rise along North America’s East Coast. That model incorporates data not just from atmospheric pressure and ocean dynamics—changing currents, rising ocean temperatures and salinity all influence sea level—but also, for the first time, ice mass change in Greenland and Antarctica. The researchers say their model supports a growing consensus that sea level rise began accelerating in 1990 and that what they found will improve estimates of future sea level rise at a local level.

Weather Patterns' Influence on Frost Timing

Gardeners know the frustration of a false spring. Coaxed outside by warm weather, some people plant their gardens in the spring only to see a sudden late frost strike at the plants with a killer freezer burn. Grumbling green thumbs, along with farmers and water supply managers, would benefit from more accurate predictions of the first and last frosts of the season.

Such timing is in flux, however. The frost-free season in North America is approximately 10 days longer now than it was a century ago. In a new study, published today in Nature Communications, researchers from the University of Utah and the U.S. Geological Survey parse the factors contributing to the timing of frost in the United States. Atmospheric circulation patterns, they found, were the dominant influence on frost timing, although the trend of globally warming temperatures played a part as well.

NASA TV Coverage Set for May 23 Space Station Contingency Spacewalk

NASA astronauts Peggy Whitson and Jack Fischer are preparing for an unscheduled spacewalk outside the International Space Station Tuesday, May 23. Live coverage will begin at 6:30 a.m. EDT on NASA Television and the agency’s website.

Whitson, Expedition 51 commander, and Fischer, flight engineer, will replace a critical computer relay box that failed May 20. The relay box, known as a multiplexer-demultiplexer (MDM), is one of two units that regulate the operation of radiators, solar arrays and cooling loops. They also route commands to other vital station systems.

NOAA names University of Michigan to host cooperative institute for Great Lakes region

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration today announced it has selected the University of Michigan to continue hosting NOAA’s cooperative institute in the Great Lakes region. 

NOAA made the selection after an open, competitive evaluation to continue funding the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research (CIGLR), formerly called the Cooperative Institute for Limnology and Ecosystems Research. 

Luminous Bacteria Will Help to Measure Radioactivity

During the research, the scientists were to answer the following questions which are currently considered to be important in the realm of radiobiology:

What are the peculiarities of low-dose gamma radiation`s effect on living creatures?

What are the differences between gamma and alpha, beta radiation in terms of their effect on living creatures?

Photobacterium phosphoreum, which is quite suitable for a comprehensive analysis of a radiation effect, was used as a test organism. In the course of the experiment, the luminous bacteria were put into an experimental capsule where they were undergoing the effect of different radiation capacity and duration under the temperatures of +5 °C, +10 °C, +20 °C.

Research suggests eating beans instead of beef would sharply reduce greenhouse gasses

A team of researchers from four American universities says the key to reducing harmful greenhouse gases (GHG) in the short term is more likely to be found on the dinner plate than at the gas pump.

The team, headed by Loma Linda University (LLU) researcher Helen Harwatt, PhD, suggests that one simple change in American eating habits would have a large impact on the environment: if Americans would eat beans instead of beef, the United States would immediately realize approximately 50 to 75 percent of its GHG reduction targets for the year 2020.

High Levels of Prenatal Air Pollution Exposure and Stress Increase Childhood Asthma Risk

A new study has found that children, especially boys, whose mothers were exposed to higher levels of outdoor particulate air pollution at the same time that they were very stressed were most likely to develop asthma by age six. The study was presented at the 2017 American Thoracic Society International Conference. 

The team, led by senior investigator Rosalind Wright, MD, MPH, co-director of the Institute for Exposomics Research at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, conducted this study because of their overarching interest in understanding how these and other environmental factors interact to produce respiratory health disparities.

NASA Adds Up Record Australia Rainfall

Over the week of May 15, extreme rainfall drenched northeastern Australia and NASA data provided a look at the record totals.

The rainfall was the heaviest rainfall in that area since tropical cyclone Debbie hit Queensland Australia in late March. Much of the recent extremely heavy rainfall was due to storms associated with a trough or elongated area of low pressure slowly moving over northeastern Queensland from the Coral Sea. More than 100 millimeters or 3.9 inches of rain in 24 hours was reported near Townsville. A trough of low pressure that moved eastward from central Australia was also encroaching into western Queensland.   

Reduced U.S. Air Pollution Will Boost Rainfall in Africa's Sahel, Says Study

Falling sulfur dioxide emissions in the United States are expected to substantially increase rainfall in Africa’s semi-arid Sahel, while bringing slightly more rain to much of the U.S., according to a new study in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

Pollution filters placed on coal-fired power plants in the United States starting in the 1970s have dramatically cut emissions of sulfur dioxide, a toxic gas that contributes to acid rain and premature deaths from respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. If U.S. sulfur dioxide emissions are cut to zero by 2100, as some researchers have projected, rainfall over the Sahel could increase up to 10 percent from 2000 levels, computer simulations published in the study suggest.

Smoke from Wildfires Can Have Lasting Climate Impact

The wildfire that has raged across more than 150,000 acres of the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia and Florida has sent smoke billowing into the sky as far as the eye can see. Now, new research published by the Georgia Institute of Technology shows how that smoke could impact the atmosphere and climate much more than previously thought.

Researchers have found that carbon particles released into the air from burning trees and other organic matter are much more likely than previously thought to travel to the upper levels of the atmosphere, where they can interfere with rays from the sun – sometimes cooling the air and at other times warming it.