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Environmental scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory have led an international collaboration to improve satellite observations of tropical forests.

Chemical products like household cleaners, pesticides, paints and perfumes that contain compounds refined from petroleum now rival motor vehicle emissions as the top source of urban air pollution, according to a surprising NOAA-led study.

The Silk Road pattern in meteorology, is a wave-like teleconnection pattern in summer propagating eastward under the wave-guidance of the upper-tropospheric Asian westerly jet stream. It shows up as alternate southerly and northerly anomalies (or cyclonic and anticyclonic circulation anomalies) along the jet, and is the leading mode of the interannual variability of upper-tropospheric meridional winds. It is interesting that this meteorological teleconnection pattern covers most domains along the ancient Silk Road, and exerts significant influences on climatic anomalies over a broad area of the Eurasian continent.

A NASA study based on an innovative technique for crunching torrents of satellite data provides the clearest picture yet of changes in Antarctic ice flow into the ocean. The findings confirm accelerating ice losses from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and reveal surprisingly steady rates of flow from its much larger neighbor to the east.

Predicting the weather a few days in advance is a complex undertaking. But what about the weather 3 to 4 weeks from now? Producing that kind of forecast is a daunting challenge  — but is crucial for a slew of communities. These future forecasts, called sub-seasonal predictions, can help energy companies determine how much power to produce to meet demands for upcoming months; they assist water resource managers controlling reservoir levels ahead of upcoming water use; they even help farmers understand which crops to plant in the face of potential dry weather.