Scientists have used satellite data to monitor underground water reserves in California’s Silicon Valley, discovering that water levels rebounded quickly after a severe drought that lasted from 2012-15.

Tropical Storm Pilar formed near the southwestern coast of Mexico on Saturday, Sept. 23 and continued hugging the coast when NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites passed overhead. Pilar weakened to a tropical depression during the late morning on Sept. 25.

A section of ice more than 100 square miles in size — four times as large as Manhattan — has broken off the Pine Island Glacier in West Antarctica. It is the fifth major calving, or ice loss, event on the glacier since 2000.

A deadly amphibian disease called severe Perkinsea infections, or SPI, is the cause of many large-scale frog die-offs in the United States, according to a new study by the U.S. Geological Survey.

Frogs and salamanders are currently among the most threatened groups of animals on the planet. The two most common frog diseases, chytridiomycosis and ranavirus infection, are linked to frog population declines worldwide. The new study suggests that that SPI is the third most common infectious disease of frogs.

Researchers have discovered a new class of enzymes in hundreds of bacterial species, including some that cause disease in humans and animals. The discovery provides new insights into how bacteria invade their hosts. The research appears this week in Nature Communications.

Human activities could trigger an altered pattern of evolution similar to what occurred 66 million years ago, when a giant asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs, leaving birds as their only descendants. 

In 2008, Jay Lemery, MD, an emergency physician in Colorado, read a commentary about the effects of global climate change on human health. The author was Paul Auerbach, MD, professor of emergency medicine at Stanford and one of the world’s leading authorities on wilderness medicine.

A NASA-produced map of areas likely damaged by the Sept. 19 magnitude 7.1 Raboso earthquake near Mexico City has been provided to Mexican authorities to help responders and groups supporting the response efforts. The quake, which struck 75 miles (120 kilometers) southeast of Mexico City, caused significant loss of life and property damage.

Many extreme events — from a rogue wave that rises up from calm waters, to an  instability inside a gas turbine, to the sudden extinction of a previously hardy wildlife species — seem to occur without warning. It’s often impossible to predict when such bursts of instability will strike, particularly in systems with a complex and ever-changing mix of players and pieces.

Jose continues to bring tropical storm conditions to southern New England although the storm has become post-tropical. NASA's Terra satellite caught a view of the storm sitting almost stationary about 100 miles from Nantucket Island, Massachusetts.